My eyes drifted to the saddle hanging on its rack, the worn leather darkened by years of use. Kristin’s initials were stamped on the fender, small but clear. I brushed my thumb over them, the gesture automatic. The sensation of it stirred a thousand small memories, her laugh echoing off barn walls, her voice sharp when she was focused, the way she leaned into my shoulder when the world finally quieted around us.
I exhaled slowly, chest tight.
The heat outside was fading, the kind of late-afternoon warmth that lingers even after the sun begins to dip. Behind me, a gate clanged shut, and the announcer’s voice echoed over the loudspeakers, calling for the final set of riders. The day wasn’t over, not for anyone else. But for me, it felt finished.
I walked out of the trailer and leaned against the metal wall, feeling the coolness press against my back. My reflection in the polished surface looked older, wearier. Dust streaked my jaw. My knuckles were raw from when I’d grabbed the railing earlier, skin split where gravel had bitten.
The ache in my chest grew heavier the longer I stood there. I’d told Tanya she didn’t get to make this about her, but the truth was that none of this was about her. It was about the woman sitting a few feet away behind that half-closed door, pretending she didn’t hear any of it.
I should have left. Should have gone back to the stands, back to the noise and the safe anonymity of the crowd. They didn’t know the story or the scars. They didn’t know how many times I’d reached for Kristin and come up empty.
But I stayed.
I stayed because something in me needed to see the place where everything had cracked open and admit that it still mattered. I stayed because some promises, spoken or not, endures, no matter how many years pass.
In the end, neither Tanya’s fury nor her pity changed a damn thing. My decision had already been made long before she approached. The second I moved toward Lady in that arena, it had been made. I’d bleed for Kristin all over again, not because I thought it made me noble, not because I wanted to, but because some parts of you never come loose, no matter how hard you try to pry them free.
The lot around me was starting to quiet. The sun hit the horizon, spilling red and gold over the parked trailers. Dust drifted in slow spirals, catching in the last light. I pushed away from the wall and looked once more at Kristin’s door.
The shadow inside shifted again.
Maybe she was just moving. Perhaps she’d heard every word.
Didn’t matter.
I’d been trying to convince myself for three years that I was free from her, and every time I saw her face, the lie evaporated like morning fog.
I walked toward the gate, each step weighed down by the weight of everything left unsaid.
Behind me, Lady blew softly, almost like a sigh. The sounds of the grounds started to fade as I moved farther from the trailers. Somewhere, a rodeo clown cracked a joke over the mic, and laughter rippling through the crowd. The moment should have felt normal, ordinary. It didn’t.
It felt like standing on the edge of something I’d been pretending didn’t exist, a cliff I’d once fallen from and somehow survived. And maybe, just maybe, I was about to climb back up.
I didn’t look back again, but the image of Kristin’s shadow in that doorway followed me every step of the way.
CHAPTER THREE
KRISTIN
The music pulsed softly through the fairgrounds hall, a fiddle running hot over steel strings while the crowd stomped to the beat. The rhythm rolled through the old building, shaking the boards beneath my boots until it felt like the whole world was shifting. Laughter, boots scuffing across the worn wood, the thick smell of beer and sweat—all of it wrapped around me like a blanket I couldn’t quite settle into. The air was close and heavy, vibrating with energy that should have made me feel alive. Instead, it pressed harder against my ribs.
I told myself I was here for distraction. For normal. For anything that didn’t feel like the ache in my hip or the pull along my ribs every time I moved too fast. The medic I’d finally seen said I’d be sore for days, that the bruises would fade, but I had to take it easy. He hadn’t mentioned how every song, every burst of laughter, would drive the ache deeper, how being surrounded by people who were laughing would make me feel even more alone.
The hall lights were dim, yellow, and uneven, casting shadows that danced across the walls with every sway of the crowd. Someone bumped into me, sloshing beer down my arm, and muttered an apology I barely heard. I nodded, smiled likeit didn’t matter, and wiped my sleeve with the back of my hand. My hip flared again, a dull, deep burn pulsing with the music.
And then I saw him.
Lincoln.
He was across the room near the bar, broad shoulders catching the glow of the neon sign, as he leaned on the counter in that slow, easy way like he owned the air around him. The sight of him hit harder than I was ready for. He looked steady, unbothered, the kind of calm that could freeze a storm mid-spin. Tanya was pressed against his side, red nails glinting as she looped her arm possessively through his. She laughed at something he said, or maybe she forced the laugh, because his mouth didn’t move much, just the faintest pull at one corner.
Our eyes met.
Just for a second.
Everything else fell away. The music, the chatter, the stomp of boots against the wood, all of it blurred into silence. The sound of the fiddle turned thin and far away, and the only thing left in the world was him. His gaze hit like a brand, searing hot, dragging across the back of my neck. My body went still, every muscle remembering him before my mind could stop it. My ribs tightened, my hip throbbed, every bruise reminding me of the fall, telling me that he’d been the one to catch me when I hit.
He shifted, a slight movement that drew my eyes to his hand, the one that looked like it might take a step toward me, but Tanya leaned closer, her red mouth moving fast against his ear, and whatever was in his eyes shuttered closed.
