Chapter 28 Wyatt #2
I glance toward the barn doors, where sunlight spills in, soft and golden.
“Because,” I say carefully, “she matters. And I don’t do casual when something matters.”
Red nods once.
Willy tilts his head. “So what are you gonna do about it?”
I’ve been circling that thought for days. In my journal. In my head. In the quiet moments when I should be sleeping.
“I’m going to ask her out,” I say.
The words feel solid. Right.
Emmett’s face lights up. “Yes!”
“Don’t cheer,” I tell him. “This is not a victory lap.”
Willy grins anyway. “Doc asking a woman on a date? That’s a whole event.”
Red’s mouth quirks, just barely. “About time.”
I blink. “You think so?”
“You don’t look at people like that often,” he says simply. “When you do, it’s worth paying attention.”
I clear my throat. “I’m… not great at this part.”
Willy laughs. “Shocking.”
“I mean it,” I say. “I’m good in emergencies. I’m good when things are broken. But asking someone to dinner feels… invasive.”
Emmett pats my shoulder. “You just saved a horse from a panic spiral. You’ll be fine.”
“Those are not the same skill sets.”
“They’re emotionally adjacent,” Willy says confidently.
Red steps back, signaling the conversation’s done in his mind. “Just don’t overthink it.”
I almost laugh.
That ship sailed somewhere around the third honey jar.
As I pack up my kit and move on to the next animal, my pulse steadies. The decision sits quietly in my chest.
Tonight, when I get home, I’ll ask her.
A plan is supposed to make you feel calmer. You’ve placed the bedlam into a container with a lid.
Instead, it makes my stomach do a slow, nauseating roll as if I just climbed onto a carnival ride I did not agree to.
I finish the rest of my rounds on Dusty Spur with the tight, mechanical focus of a man trying not to think about hazel eyes while palpating a tendon.
A mare with a mild fetlock strain gets cold hosed and wrapped.
A yearling colt gets his vaccines and a stern lecture about biting, mostly for my own emotional satisfaction.
A goat has a suspicious rash that turns out to be normal. That little bugger gets in everywhere.
And when I finally wash up, stow my kit, and climb into my truck, it’s late afternoon and my shirt is stuck to my back and my brain is still stuck on Abilene Kentwood.
Emmett leans into my open window as I’m about to pull away.
“Hey,” he says, grin bright. “If you chicken out, I’m telling her you think she’s cool.”
“I will run you over with my truck,” I tell him pleasantly.
He beams. “Love you too!”
Willy appears behind him, a gremlin summoned by pandemonium.
“Get her somethin’,” he advises. “Women like gifts.”
Red, passing by with a lead rope over his shoulder, tosses, “Don’t make it weird,” as if that’s easy to do.
I drive away, and at first, I tell myself I’m going straight home.
I really do.
I even pass the first turnoff with conviction.
Then I pass the second with stubbornness.
By the time Larsen’s General Store comes into view, I’m already slowing down, as if my truck has opinions separate from my brain.
“Okay,” I mutter to myself, pulling into the gravel lot. “Fine. We’re doing this. We’re being… thoughtful. Normal. Like a person.”
My truck, in response, makes a sound that feels judgmental.
Larsen’s has been sitting on that corner longer than most of the town’s grudges.
The windows are full of practical things and weird things: seed packets and canned peaches, cheap toys that will definitely break, a rack of postcards nobody mails, and a display of local goods because Colter Creek is stubbornly proud of itself.
The bell over the door jingles when I step inside.
Cool air hits my face. The smell is an odd blend of pine cleaner, old candy, and whatever’s been brewing in the coffee pot behind the counter since 1997.
“Wyatt Tucker,” a voice calls out, rich with amusement.
Mrs. Larsen is behind the counter, silver hair in a braid, reading glasses on a chain, expression sharp enough to cut twine.
“Afternoon,” I say, aiming for casual and landing somewhere near “man who has never been casual in his life.”
She looks me up and down. “You look like you wrestled a cow and lost.”
“I didn’t lose,” I say automatically.
Her smile deepens. “That’s what all the losers say.”
I ignore that. I glance around the store, suddenly overwhelmed by the fact that this is a terrible place to buy a romantic gift.
Larsen’s sells necessities and impulse purchases. No one comes here for grand gestures unless the grand gesture involves a snow shovel.
Still… Abilene isn’t a grand gesture kind of person.
I scan shelves, looking for a diagnosis.
My eyes catch on a display of soaps and lotions near the window. Local brands, mild scents, beeswax hand salve in tins.
It’s the kind of thing a beekeeper might actually use, especially after working hives and handling equipment.
I reach for a tin, read the label.
HAND SALVE — UNSCENTED — MADE WITH BEESWAX + HONEY
My chest does a weird little thump.
This would be perfect.
It’s practical. It’s thoughtful. It’s not creepy.
I pick it up, then immediately think: Is it creepy?
I mean… she makes honey. She has bees. Buying her a beeswax product could be interpreted as either “I noticed what you do and I respect it” or “I saw you once with a hive tool and decided your entire personality is bees.”
I set it down.
Then pick it up again.
Maybe with something else, I think, as if my brain is assembling a treatment plan.
I move toward the small gift section. Mugs. Tea infusers. Little notebooks with floral covers. A display of dried herb bundles with tiny tags that say things such as CALM and SLEEP and DON’T MURDER ANYONE TODAY.
I stop.
Chamomile.
It’s sitting there in a little glass jar with dried blossoms, tied with twine.
I stare at it for a full five seconds.
This is the universe mocking me. It has to be.
Because Abilene and I literally shared chamomile tea in that cabin while the world burned outside, and it was the most intimate conversation I’ve had in years, and if I buy her chamomile now, I might as well write I’ve been thinking about you on my forehead in permanent marker.
Which… is not inaccurate.
But still.
I clear my throat, grab the jar anyway, and add it to my growing “I’m definitely normal” pile.
Then I see it.
A small pot on the shelf near the register with a tiny painted label: WILDFLOWER SEED MIX — POLLINATOR FRIENDLY.
I freeze.
Bees.
Flowers.
Her whole world.
It’s not about the bees as a personality trait. It’s about the way she builds life around them. About how she makes something sweet out of disorder.
I pick up the packet carefully.
Three things now: hand salve, chamomile, wildflower seeds.
This is either charming or deeply unhinged.
Mrs. Larsen watches me drift toward the counter.
“Well,” she says, tapping a pen against the register. “Either you’ve taken up gardening and tea drinking, or you’re courting.”
I stop dead.
“No,” I say too quickly.
Her eyebrows lift. “No?”
“I mean…” I clear my throat. “That’s not… I’m not…”
She leans on the counter, delighted. “Wyatt Tucker is flustered. I’d like to mark this day on the calendar.”
“I’m not flustered,” I lie.
She glances pointedly at the chamomile jar. “Flower water says otherwise.”
I exhale slowly through my nose. “Can you just… ring these up?”
“Oh, I’ll ring them up,” she says, too cheerful. “But first, I’m going to guess.”
I stare at her. She stares right back, eyes glittering.
Finally, she says, “Abilene Kentwood.”
My spine goes rigid.
“How—”
She waves a hand. “Abilene comes in here twice a month. Always buys the same thing. Always looks like she’s thinking about a hundred different tasks at once.
And you,” she points her pen at my chest, “have the expression of a man who has discovered something soft and doesn’t know what to do with it. ”
I open my mouth.
Close it.
Then, because apparently today is the day I stop pretending, I say quietly, “I’m going to ask her out.”
Mrs. Larsen’s face softens, just a fraction. The teasing doesn’t disappear, but there’s a gentleness under it.
“Good,” she says simply, and starts ringing me up. “She deserves someone steady.”
My chest tightens.
“That’s not…” I begin, but the words get tangled. Because what I want to say is: I’m not sure I’m steady when it comes to her. What comes out is: “I’m trying.”
Mrs. Larsen nods. She understands more than she’s letting on. “Then don’t overcomplicate it. Give her the gift. Ask her out. Then shut up and let her answer.”
I blink. “That’s… blunt.”
“It’s practical,” she counters. “Like these seeds.”
She slides the items into a small paper bag, then pauses and reaches under the counter. She pulls out a little strip of ribbon, yellow, of course, and ties it around the handles with an efficiency that suggests she’s done this for half the town at one point or another.
“There,” she says, handing it to me. “Now it looks intentional, not like you panicked in aisle three.”
I take the bag, feeling absurdly grateful.
“Thank you,” I say, and mean it.
She waves me off. “Go on. Before you talk yourself out of it.”
I head for the door, then stop and glance back. “Hey, Mrs. Larsen?”
“Yes?”
“If she throws this at my head,” I say, “you didn’t see me.”
She smiles, bright and sharp. “If she throws it at your head, Wyatt Tucker, you probably deserved it.”
The bell jingles as I step back outside.
I sit in my truck, bag on the passenger seat, hands on the steering wheel.
My heart thuds.
This is ridiculous. This is terrifying.
This is… right.
Right?