Chapter 9
Chapter
Nine
LEVI
Idon’t go looking for her. That’s the first mistake.
I tell myself she needs space. That pushing now will only make things worse. That this is already done, and the best thing I can do is let it settle where it fell.
I’ve lived by that kind of thinking for a long time.
Give it distance. Let it cool. Move on.
It’s always worked. But it doesn’t now.
I feel it all day.
In the way the barn sounds different. In the way my hands don’t settle right on the work. In the way I keep looking toward the path that leads to the cabins like I expect to see her coming back anyway.
She doesn’t.
By late afternoon, the quiet I usually long for starts to feel wrong. Tired.
I finish checking the last stall and step outside, wiping my hands on my jeans more out of habit than anything else.
The air’s thick and hot. Everything half-baked or burning.
I should feel better.
But I can’t deny it. I’m miserable.
Something moves at the edge of the paddock. I turn without thinking. It’s her.
Dakota stands at the fence, one hand resting on the top rail, the other stretched out toward Buddy.
He’s closer to her now than I’ve ever seen him.
Close enough that when she murmurs something soft, he lowers his head in her direction.
Not all the way, but enough to show trust.
Trust, in small pieces. How it always starts.
She laughs under her breath, the sound carrying faintly across the distance. “You’re doing better,” she says to the horse. “Look at you.”
Her voice is gentle. Proud. The kind of tone you use when something matters. How she used to talk to me.
My chest tightens.
She runs her hand along the fence, not quite touching him, but near enough that he doesn’t pull away.
“I guess that’s how it goes,” she says softly. “You think something’s too broken to fix… and then it isn’t.”
I shift my weight. Unlike Buddy, I’m a kind of broken she can’t fix.
Right?
Still it hits me. I can walk over there. Say something. Stop this before it ends the way I already know it will.
But I don’t.
My second mistake.
I stand there instead, letting the distance hold. Allowing the old instinct to take over.
Wait. Let it pass. Let her go. Easier that way.
Safer, too.
The thought comes fast, familiar as breath.
You’ll ruin it anyway.
I’ve lived with that one long enough it barely feels like a thought anymore. Just truth.
Things like her don’t stay. Things like her don’t choose men like me.
And if they do… they leave.
They always leave.
I watch her tuck a loose strand of hair behind her ear, her gaze still on the horse.
“I should go,” she murmurs. “Before I change my mind.”
My stomach drops. Something in that sentence sounds wrong. Too final.
She steps back from the fence, turning. That’s when I see it. The bag slung over her shoulder.
Ready. Packed. Gone.
The world narrows.
Everything I told myself a second ago—about distance, about waiting, about letting it settle—collapses under one sharp realization.
She isn’t staying long enough for me to figure this out.
She’s leaving because of me. Because I let her walk away once already.
The gelding shifts at the fence, head lifting like he’s noticing the change, too.
You’re doing the same thing to her.
The thought hits hard and clean.
Half trust. Not trust at all.
I’m not protecting anything. Or preserving control. Nope, just repeating the same tired loop.
Letting something good walk out because it feels safer than putting skin in the game. Easier than taking a chance.
I exhale once, rough.
That’s the moment. The one that splits everything in two. Before and after.
I push off from where I’ve been standing and start walking. Each step feels like breaking through something that’s held for years.
The closer I get, the clearer it becomes.
This isn’t about her leaving. It’s about me letting her.
About standing still when I should’ve moved. Choosing distance because it feels safer than wanting something enough to fight for it.
Dakota reaches the gate. Her hand closes around the latch.
“Dakota.”
My voice cuts across the space between us. She stops, then turns slowly.
Her once-bright expression is guarded now. I did that. I deserve it.
I pause a few feet away. Close enough to see the question in her eyes. “I saw you out here,” I say. It’s not what I mean to say. It’s what comes out.
She nods once. “Saying goodbye.” The word lands heavier than it should.
“Don’t,” I say.
Her brows pull together slightly. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t say it like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like it’s done.”
Silence stretches between us.
She arches a brow. “Isn’t it?” she asks.
There’s no accusation in it. That’s worse.
I drag a hand over my jaw, searching for words I’m not used to saying.
Not out loud. Not where someone can hear them and expect them to mean something.
“I thought I was doing the right thing,” I say.
She doesn’t answer.
“For a long time,” I continue, slower now, “I figured if I kept things at a distance, I wouldn’t have to deal with what happens when they go wrong.”
Her gaze sharpens slightly. “When they go wrong,” she repeats.
“Yeah.”
“And the other night… in the barn?”
I meet her eyes. “That wasn’t wrong.”
Her breath shifts almost imperceptibly. “Then why—”
“Because I don’t trust it,” I cut in. “Not you. This. What this turns into.”
The words aren’t clean. They’re not polished. But they’re honest.
“That’s not the same thing,” she says.
“I know.”
I take a step nearer. Now we’re close enough that I can see the flicker of something behind her restraint.
Hope. Caution. Maybe both.
“I’ve spent a long time fixing things that were already halfway gone,” I say. “Things that weren’t going to stay, no matter what I did.”
She holds my gaze. “And you think I’m one of those things?”
“No,” I say. “That’s the problem.”
I hesitate, gulping air, fighting for the right words.
“If you don’t,” she says carefully, “then why are you treating me like I am?”
It’s easier than admitting I want you to stay. Because wanting something this much feels like handing over the one thing I’ve kept locked down. Because if you stay, I have to believe something different than I’ve believed my whole life.
I take another step.
Close enough now that the space between us feels like something I could cross.
“Because I don’t know how to do this without wrecking it,” I say.
Her eyes soften. “That’s not your decision to make alone,” she says.
I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. Then I do the one thing I should’ve done the first time.
I move toward her. My hand closes around hers, warm and steady.
She doesn’t pull away.
“That thing you said,” I add, quieter now. “About keeping a distance.” Her fingers tighten slightly in mine. “You were right. But I don’t want to do that with you.”
The admission feels like stepping off something solid. Like there’s no going back to where I was before this.
“Yeah?” she says.
“Yeah.”
I close the distance. Now there’s no space left at all.
“I don’t want you leaving me,” I say. “I don’t want us to be one-time.”
Her breath catches, blue-green eyes shining like jewels.
“But you already know that,” I say voice dropping.
Her face is torn, eyes measuring me. “And tomorrow?” she asks.
“I’ll still want that.”
“And after that?”
I hold her gaze. “That’s the part we figure out together.”
I don’t offer her a fairytale. Or make promises I can’t keep. Just the truth. Without walls or predetermined outcomes.
“And you’re okay with that?” she asks.
“No,” I say. “But I’m more okay with trying than I am with letting you walk away because I was too scared to move.”
Something shifts in her expression—less guarded now. “That sounds different than your thoughts in the barn,” she says.
“It is.”
“Why?”
I glance past her for a second, toward the paddock. Buddy stands there, watching. Still wary. Still uncertain. But closer than he was yesterday.
“Because I finally realized I’m doing the same thing to you that I hate seeing in them,” I say.
Her gaze follows mine, then comes back. “And that is?”
“Walking away before things have a chance to hold.”
Dakota studies me for a long moment. “Okay,” she says.
“Okay?” I repeat.
“Okay,” she says again. “We try.”
We try.
That’s enough. More than enough.
I pull her closer then, not rushed, not unsure, and kiss her like I should’ve from the start.
Not like it’s a mistake.
Like it matters.