Chapter 22
Wyatt
Six days. It had been six days since Ivy left for Dallas, and every one of them had crawled by like a wounded animal. I'd tried to be patient, to trust, to remember that she'd promised to come back. But old fears died hard, and every morning I woke up reaching for someone who wasn't there.
I was out on the fence line by dawn, needing the physical work to quiet my restless mind. The posts I was replacing didn't really need it—Hunter and I had fixed this section just last month—but my hands needed something to do besides reaching for my phone every five minutes.
The morning was already heating up, promising another scorcher. Sweat soaked through my shirt as I worked, muscles burning with the familiar rhythm of ranch labor. This was what I knew—wood and wire, soil and sky, the eternal maintenance of boundaries that kept things where they belonged.
Six days she'd been gone, but she'd texted constantly. Photos of boxes. Updates on lease negotiations. A selfie from a gas station halfway between Dallas and forever. Each message a breadcrumb trail proving she was coming back, but still my chest stayed tight with waiting.
How much longer? I’d asked
Soon.
Soon. Such a vague word when what I wanted was exact coordinates, an ETA, proof that this wasn't another dream I'd wake from alone.
I went back to the fence, driving posts with perhaps more force than necessary.
The sun climbed higher, and I stripped off my shirt, using it to wipe sweat from my face.
The ranch spread around me in every direction—land that had been in my family for four generations, land I'd nearly lost during the drought, land I'd saved through stubbornness and the kind of hope that borders on delusion.
The same kind of hope that had made me build a cabin for a ghost.
Movement caught my eye—dust rising on the main road, the kind that meant someone was coming. My heart jumped, but I forced it down. Could be anyone. Delivery truck. One of the hands coming back from town. Anyone.
But as the vehicle crested the hill, I knew.
That was Ivy's car, loaded down with boxes, looking like everything I'd ever wanted coming home.
The hammer slipped from my numb fingers, landing in the dirt with a dull thud.
My heart slammed against my ribs so hard I thought they might crack.
Six days of trying to breathe normally, of pretending I wasn't terrified she'd change her mind, of acting like I wasn't counting minutes—all of it collapsed as her car turned down the ranch road.
I couldn't move. Could barely breathe. Just stood there shirtless and sweating, probably looking like a fool, as she pulled up to where I'd been working. The engine died, and for a moment neither of us moved. Through the windshield, I could see her smiling, tears streaming down her face.
Then she was out of the car, and I was moving without conscious thought, meeting her halfway. She was wearing jeans and an old Copper Creek High t-shirt I recognized as one of mine, the horseshoe pendant glinting at her throat.
"I told you I was coming back," she said, voice thick with emotion.
"You're early," was all I could manage.
"Turns out I'm impatient too."
I pulled her close, probably too hard, definitely too desperate, but she just held on tighter. She smelled like road dust and coffee and home, and I buried my face in her hair, breathing her in like I'd been suffocating without her.
"You're home now," I said, the words coming out ragged, broken. "You're actually home."
"I'm home," she agreed, pulling back enough to look at me. Her hands framed my face, thumbs wiping away moisture I hadn't realized was there. "I'm home, and I'm never leaving again. The papers are signed, the apartment's empty, everything I own is in that car, and I am exactly where I belong."
"Say it again."
"Which part?"
"All of it."
She laughed, the sound bright as morning.
"I'm home, Wyatt Blackwood. Home to stay.
To build that breeding program. To have Sunday dinners with your family.
To wake up in our cabin and drink coffee on the porch and probably argue about fence placement and definitely make up after.
" Her voice dropped, went serious. "To love you for whatever time we're given, because I've wasted enough of it being scared. "
I kissed her then, right there on the side of the road where anyone could see. Kissed her like I was drowning and she was air. Like I was lost and she was the map home. Like we were eighteen and eighty all at once, with our whole lives ahead and behind us.
When we finally broke apart, both breathing hard, she laughed again. "You're going to have to help me unload the car."
"Later," I said, already pulling her back. "Everything else can wait."
"The ice cream in my cooler can't."
"You brought ice cream?"
"Blue Bell. Cookies and cream. Thought we could eat it on the porch tonight and talk about the future."
"Our future."
"Ours," she agreed, and the word sounded like a prayer answered.
We stood there under the brutal Texas sun, neither of us willing to let go yet.
The ranch stretched around us—the cattle in the east pasture, the barns needing paint, the house where Mom was probably already planning a welcome home dinner.
The creek glinted in the distance, witness to our beginning, our ending, our beginning again.
"What are you thinking?" she asked, her hand finding mine, fingers interlacing like they were meant to fit together.
"That some things are worth the wait," I said. "That broken things can heal stronger. That home isn't just a place but a person, and mine just pulled up in a truck full of boxes and melting ice cream."
"Very poetic for a rancher."
"You inspire me."
"I love you," she said simply. "I loved you at eighteen, and I loved you through all the years between, and I love you now. Different but the same. Deeper. Truer. Without conditions or fear."
"I love you too," I said, the words feeling bigger than language could hold. "Always have. Always will."
A truck honked as it passed—Jimmy, grinning and waving, probably already spreading the news that Ivy was back. By dinner, everyone would know. By tomorrow, the whole county would be talking.
Let them talk. Let them see that sometimes love wins. Sometimes people find their way back. Sometimes the story that seems over is just paused, waiting for the right moment to continue.
"Come on," I said, grabbing my discarded shirt and hammer. "Let's get your ice cream in the freezer, then I'll help you unpack."
"Actually," she said, a mischievous glint in her eye, "I thought maybe we could christen the homecoming first. The ice cream's in a pretty good cooler."
"Woman, you're going to be the death of me."
"But what a way to go."
I laughed, pulled her close again, kissed her because I could, because she was here, because the universe had given us a second chance, and we were taking it with both hands.
The creek sang its ancient song in the distance, the sound carrying on the wind like a blessing. Some things, it seemed to say, were meant to be. No matter how long it took. No matter how far they traveled apart.
Some things always found their way home.
And Ivy Garrison—my first love, my last love, my only love—was finally, permanently, beautifully home.