Horses Don’t Miss People #2
On the way, I nearly tripped over Bandit, the Lockhart barn cat and unofficial king of the ranch.
He was loitering in the shade of a wheelbarrow, tail twitching, eyes bright and feral.
Bandit was infamous for his attitude—he’d once chased off a coyote twice his size, and rumor had it that he could open locked doors if he set his mind to it.
He regarded me with the cool indifference of a creature who had seen too much and cared too little.
“Hey, Bandit.” I crouched down to scratch behind his ears. He immediately rolled onto his back, exposing his belly. I gave him a cautious rub, and he rewarded me with a brief, imperious headbutt before darting away toward the goat pen.
It was then, as I watched Bandit disappear between the rails of the fence, that I heard footsteps behind me. I turned to see Dawson standing in the stable’s shadow, arms crossed, a streak of early-morning sunlight catching on the highlight in his thick, chestnut colored hair.
My eyes scanned up his forearms, corded and steady, the lines of his body a familiar geometry I’d spent my entire adolescence memorizing.
I had no idea what to say to him, not after the rawness of last night. Not after who I’d just seen at the end of the driveway. Our eyes met, and the tension snapped into something else—something charged, direct, and almost unbearably intimate.
“Hey,” I said, my voice coming out more uncertain than I’d intended.
“You picked up Herbie,” he observed, voice low and rough with sleep or maybe something else.
I blinked, momentarily thrown, as I stood up. “Yeah, I went for a run and ended up at Buddy’s. Thanks again for getting him running.”
“Of course.”
I wanted to ask if he was okay after last night, if he meant what he’d said about not remembering, if he was as haunted by the past as I was. Instead, I hovered in the aisle like some lost specter.
“So,” I said, and then floundered in the silence. “I saw Angie on my way in.”
My statement filled the hush of the barn.
“Yeah,” he said, finally. “She stopped by with donuts and coffee.”
Donuts and coffee. That sounded familiar. It was the same thing I’d brought when I discovered Dawson and Vicki.
I nodded, pretending to be fascinated by a coil of lead ropes hanging on the wall. “Did she…does she know about…”
“Yes.”
My eyes lifted to his. “Was she… upset?”
He shook his head, lips pressed into a line. “No. Not really.”
I tried to process that, tried to believe it could be true. Dr. Chang was everything I wasn’t, practical, driven, beautiful in a way that required zero maintenance and even less self-doubt. She was also, apparently, disposable. Or maybe I was projecting.
Dawson must have caught the doubt in my expression, because he added, “It’s not what you think. It wasn’t serious.”
“That’s not what it looked like from the end of the driveway,” I said, immediately wishing I hadn’t.
He turned then, crossing his arms over his chest. “What did it look like?”
I shrugged, suddenly wishing for a black hole to swallow me up. “I don’t know. Like maybe she thought it was serious.”
He let out a breath that wasn’t quite a laugh. “She didn’t. We weren’t exclusive. She was seeing other people.”
“She’s beautiful,” I blurted out, I’m not sure why.
“So are you,” he said, and the way he said it—like it was the only fact that mattered—made something inside me start to fray at the edges. “We weren’t exclusive, but it doesn’t matter because I told her I’m not interested in seeing her anymore.”
“I hope you didn’t do that for me,” I lied. It shouldn’t make me happy thinking he called things off with Angie for me, but it did. It absolutely did. Which made zero sense.
Inevitably, I was going to leave again, once I got Buddy settled into whatever the next chapter of his life looked like. Dawson shouldn’t be making life decisions based on me, or what happened between us the night before.
“You didn’t, did you?” I followed up.
“What?” Dawson asked.
I couldn’t tell if he was truly clueless about what I was asking or if he was pretending to be for some reason that wasn’t immediately apparent to me.
“Break things off with her because of me,” I spelled it out.
He stared at me for a long moment. I found myself holding my breath in anticipation of his response. When he finally spoke, it took a second for my brain to catch up to what he’d said.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, Sadie.” His voice was quieter now, but no less intense.
I wanted to say: I don’t know, either. I wanted to say: I need you to tell me that you didn’t just torch your whole life because of last night. Because of me.
I needed to know that I wasn’t the problem. Or, at the very least, that I wasn’t the only one.
He watched me for a long time, the silence ringing louder than any argument we’d ever had. Finally, he gave a little shake of his head, like he’d reached the end of himself.
“I ended it because it wasn’t going anywhere,” he sighed. “And because it wasn’t fair to keep seeing her when I couldn’t give her what she wanted.” He paused, then looked directly at me, his eyes so steady it was almost unbearable. “You know how that feels, right?”
I did. I absolutely did.
He looked down at the pile of alfalfa, then back at me, the mask slipping just for a second. “It’s not about you,” he assured me. “But it is, too. I can’t pretend she’s even in the same universe as you.”
I felt my cheeks heat, but inside, every nerve ending was on high alert. I didn’t want to care this much. I didn’t want the complicated tangle of relief and hope and guilt that twisted through me at the thought of him being single. But it was there.
There was a moment, then, when neither of us moved. The barn felt suddenly much too small, the air too thin. Out in the paddock, the cattle lowed, and through the open barn doors, I could see the wind stirring the wild grass.
“If you’re worried about Angie,” Dawson said, “don’t. She’ll be fine. She’s got half the county lining up to take her out.”
I knew from experience, it wouldn’t matter if the entire state, the entire country was lined up to take me out, none of them were Dawson Lockhart. He was one of a kind, and once you fell for him, getting over him was impossible. I was proof of that.
Of course, I wasn’t going to share that with him.
Instead, a weak smile tugged at the corner of my lips. “I guess that makes it easier, knowing she won’t be home crying into a pint of ice cream.”
He mirrored my grin. “If she were, she’d never admit it.”
We both stood, staring at one another smiling, softly, and something loosened between us.
It wasn’t forgiveness, not exactly, but maybe the next best thing.
Acceptance for the past and silent acknowledgement of what we meant to each other, which caused me to panic.
It scared me. Keeping Dawson at a safe distance was my only shot of leaving this town with my already broken heart still somewhat functional.
Every second I spent in his presence was threatening that possibility.
I took in a shaky breath, arms wrapped tight around myself. “I don’t know why I care so much. It’s none of my business.”
His expression softened, and for a second, he looked almost… sad?
“I do,” he said quietly. “You always cared more about other people than yourself.”
My eyes stung, but I blinked it away and tried to sound casual. “And you always pretended you didn’t care about anything, including yourself.”
He smiled, a real one this time. “I’m still pretending.”
I wanted to reach for him, but I didn’t trust myself. Not when my defenses were this thin.
“So,” I said, forcing my voice to steady, “what now?”
Dawson shrugged. “You tell me, Sadie. You’re the one who took off for New York and never looked back.”
That stung, but I didn’t flinch. “I did what I had to.” I pressed my lips together. “At least what I thought I did.”