Chapter 9 Jack
Jack
I gave her a day.
One full day of space, of distance, of watching her rebuild every wall I'd taken down. She needed it—I could see that in the rigid set of her shoulders, the clipped snap of her voice, the way she treated eye contact with me like a loaded weapon.
So I stayed away.
It was harder than I expected.
I worked the horses, keeping my hands busy and my head from wandering.
Dancer was making real progress now—she let me touch her face, followed my movement in the paddock without the skittering tension that had defined her first week.
A week and a half of consistent work, consistent presence, consistent proof that I wasn't going anywhere.
Horses were like that. You couldn't rush the trust. You just had to show up, day after day, and let them decide you were safe.
I was starting to think the parallels between her and Maggie were getting a little too on the nose. And if it weren't so sad, I’d find it amusing.
I ate dinner in the bunkhouse with the other hands. Made small talk. Pretended I wasn't counting the hours.
Sully knew something was off. He'd been watching me all day with that look—the one that said he had opinions about my choices and none of them were complimentary.
"I know," I told him that night, sitting on the bunkhouse porch as the last light bled out of the sky. "I know I should leave it alone."
He huffed through his nose. A sound Brad would have translated as, Quit lying to yourself, Remington.
"Yeah," I muttered. "I don't believe me either.” And went to bed.
The next evening, I couldn’t take it anymore, and walked to her cabin.
Not because I'd planned to. Not because I'd made any kind of decision. I just finished dinner, scratched Sully behind the ears, and started walking. My boots knew where they were going, even if my head was still arguing about whether this was smart.
It probably wasn't.
I went anyway.
The light was on in her window. I crossed the distance to her porch, Sully at my heels, climbed the three steps, and we sat down on the top one.
Then I waited.
Not because I was playing a game. I waited because showing up was my move—opening the door was hers. If she wanted to pretend she hadn't heard me, or turn off the light and wait me out, or open the door and tell me to leave—all of that was her call.
The night was quiet. Crickets. Wind. The distant lowing of cattle settling for sleep. Sully lay beside me, his body warm against my thigh, his attention fixed on the door with the same patience I was trying to practice.
One minute passed. Then two.
I heard movement inside—footsteps crossing the floor, stopping, starting again. She knew I was here. And now she was deciding what to do about it.
The door opened.
Maggie stood in the doorway, backlit by lamplight, wearing sleep shorts and a tank top that hung off one shoulder. Hair down. Feet bare. Arms crossed—but loosely this time, like the defense was more habit than conviction.
She looked tired. Beautiful. Like a woman who'd spent twenty-four hours fighting a battle she'd already lost.
"You're here," she said. There was a mix of surprise and relief in her eyes that made me want to storm inside and remind her how good we were together.
Instead, I said, “I’m here."
"I didn't hear you knock."
“Cause I didn’t.”
Something shifted in her expression—not surprise, exactly. More like recognition. Like she'd expected exactly this. "So you just sat on my porch. Waiting."
I shrugged once. "Seemed fair. Figured the least I could do was give you the choice."
She leaned against the doorframe and crossed her arms. "And if I hadn't opened the door?"
"Then I'd have gone back to the bunkhouse. And tomorrow we'd have gone back to ma'am and Mr. Remington and pretended real hard."
"Would that have worked?"
"Not even a little."
The corner of her mouth twitched. Not a smile—not yet—but the ghost of one. "I made rules," she said. "Yesterday. After you left."
"I’m sure you did."
Her eyebrows shot up. "How—"
"Ivy said you reorganized the supply shed." I let a beat pass. "You reorganize things when you're trying not to think about something."
Her brows pulled together, and she stood up straight. “You don't know that.” Her tone came out defensive, but I didn’t take it personally. I knew Maggie hated the idea of me knowing her intimately. Of knowing what made her tick, what soothed her when she was troubled.
"I've been watching you for ten days, Maggie. I know that."
She uncrossed her arms. Recrossed them. Uncrossed them again, like she couldn't figure out what to do with her hands now that the barricade wasn't holding.
"My rules were good," she said. "Sensible. Professional."
"I believe you."
"They lasted about four hours."
My brows raised a fraction, amused. “That long, huh?”
"Shut up." But there was no heat in it. Her voice was fraying at the edges, the control she'd been white-knuckling all day finally starting to slip. "I spent the entire day trying not to think about you. And every single section of the breeding proposal that needs your data felt like a trap."
"That sounds exhausting."
"It was." She looked at me, and the fight went out of her eyes.
Just—left. Like a candle guttering out. "I'm so tired, Jack.
I'm tired of pretending I don't want this.
I'm tired of making rules I'm going to break.
I'm tired of lying in bed at midnight being furious at you for doing exactly what I asked you to do. "
I stood up slowly, giving her room, giving her time.
"I've only got one rule," I said.
"Just one?"
"I won't pretend this is less than it is." I climbed the last step, putting us level, close enough that I could see the faint shadows under her eyes. "Whatever it is—and I don't need you to name it—I won't act like it doesn't matter. That's the only thing I'm asking."
She swallowed. "That's a lot to ask,” she whispered.
"I know."
She studied me for a long moment. I let her look. Let her see whatever she needed to see—the want, the patience, the fact that I was standing on her porch yet again because I couldn't make myself stay away any more than she could make herself keep the door closed.
"You know what Ivy said to me?" Maggie said quietly. "On the phone, the other night. Before any of this."
"What?"
"She said there's a difference between careful and closed." Her voice was barely above a whisper. "And she wasn't sure I knew which one I was anymore."
"What do you think?"
"I think I've been closed for a very long time." She swallowed. "And I think you're the first person who's made me want to find out what it feels like to open."
The words landed somewhere deep in my chest—deeper than want, deeper than attraction. Somewhere in the territory of things that couldn't be taken back.
"Then open the door, Maggie."
She reached for the front of my shirt, gathered the fabric in her fist, and pulled me across the threshold.
The cabin was dim. Just the desk lamp, throwing warm amber light across the room. Her laptop was closed this time. The quilt on the couch was rumpled. A mug of tea sat on the side table, half-finished and long cold.
The door closed behind us, and Maggie didn't let go of my shirt.
She stood there with her fist in the fabric, her face tilted up to mine, and I watched the last wall come down. Not dramatically. Not all at once. Just a quiet dissolution—the tension in her jaw releasing, her shoulders dropping, her eyes going soft in a way that made my throat tight.
"I don't want to fight it tonight," she said. "I'm done fighting it."
"Then don't."
She kissed me first.
That mattered. The other times, I'd kissed her.
. This time, she rose up on her bare toes and put her mouth on mine, and the kiss was different from anything that had come before—not desperate, not urgent, not the collision of two people who'd been resisting too long.
It was deliberate. Chosen. A woman deciding, with her eyes open and her mind clear, that she wanted this.
Wanted me.
I let her lead. Let her set the pace of the kiss, let her hands slide up my chest, let her fingers find the top button of my shirt, and work it open.
Then the second. Then the third. Taking her time.
Learning the act of undressing me the way I'd learned the act of undressing her—slowly, deliberately, like the unwrapping was part of the gift.
My shirt hit the floor. Her palms pressed flat against my bare chest, and I felt her exhale—a long, shuddering breath, like she'd been holding it for two days and finally let it go.
"I reorganized the supply shed because of this," she murmured against my collarbone. "Because I couldn't stop thinking about what you feel like under my hands."
"And?"
She traced the line of muscle down my ribs, watching her own fingers move across my skin. “Way better than the supply shed."
I couldn’t stop my laugh. "High praise."
"Don't let it go to your head."
I caught her chin. Tilted her face up. "Too late."
I kissed her then—deep and slow, the kind of kiss that had a destination but was in no hurry to get there.
She made a sound against my mouth, her hands gripping my sides, and I felt her body press into mine—deliberate, full-length, nothing between us but her tank top and the thin cotton of her shorts.
I pulled back just enough to look at her.
"Tell me what you want tonight, beautiful."
Her eyes searched mine. "I want to feel it. All of it. I don't want to be so lost in the rush that I can't—" She paused, choose her words carefully. "The other night was incredible. But it was a hurricane. I want to be present this time. I want to remember every second."
The idea of taking my sweet time with Maggie made me throb. "Then we go slow."
"Slow," she repeated, like she was tasting the word. Testing whether she trusted it.
"Come here."