The words landed between us, heavy with history I was only beginning to understand.
"You told me some of it before." My voice was gentle, careful, giving him an exit if he needed one. I kept my eyes on the horizon, on the mountains standing sentinel in the distance, not wanting to push but wanting him to know I was listening. "About your father. About inheriting this place young. But I got the feeling there was more you didn't say."
Reid was quiet for a long moment, the only sounds the creak of leather and the steady rhythm of hoofbeats.
"There was." His voice was rough, scraping out of his chest like it cost him something to speak. His jaw had tightened, amuscle jumping beneath his stubbled cheek, his dark eyes fixed on some point in the distance that only he could see. "I told you he was a drunk, that he nearly lost everything. What I didn't tell you was how close I came to finishing what he started."
I didn't say anything. Didn't offer empty condolences or try to fill the silence with meaningless words. Just let him speak at his own pace, in his own time, the way he'd let me speak in mine.
"The night of his funeral, I got drunk." Reid's voice had gone flat, distant, like he was reciting facts about someone else's life. His hands were tight on the reins, knuckles going white beneath his weathered skin. "Sat in the barn with a bottle of his whiskey and a book of matches, trying to decide whether to burn the whole place down or just walk away and let it rot. I was so angry, Aster. At him, at myself, at everything he'd left me with. All that debt, all that damage, all that rage he'd poured into me with nowhere to put it."
"Reid." His name slipped out before I could stop it, soft and aching with empathy I hadn't known I could feel. He turned his head to look at me, and something in his expression shifted—the hard edges softening slightly, the walls lowering just enough to let me see the wounded man beneath the steady facade.
"I told you before that I was angry." His voice was rough, honest, each word carefully chosen and deliberately spoken. His dark eyes held mine, burning with old pain and hard-won wisdom. "What I didn't tell you was that I had those matches lit. I was seconds away from watching everything burn—my father's legacy, my inheritance, all of it. I wanted to destroy it the way he'd destroyed me."
The words hit me like a physical blow, stealing my breath. I knew that feeling—knew it intimately, viscerally, in the marrow of my bones. The fear of becoming the thing that had broken you. The terror of looking in the mirror and seeing a monster staring back.
"What changed?" My voice was barely a whisper, rough with emotion I couldn't hide. I pulled Copper to a stop, needing to give this moment the weight it deserved, needing to look at him without the distraction of movement.
Reid stopped Thunder beside me, the two horses standing side by side on the ridge, the whole of Longhorn Ranch spread out below us like a painting.
"Hank." A ghost of a smile crossed Reid's face, there and gone, softening the hard lines of his jaw. His eyes had gone distant, lost in memory. "He found me there, drunk off my ass, matches in hand. Didn't judge me. Didn't lecture me. Just sat down next to me in the hay and said, 'The land doesn't care who your daddy was. It only cares what you do with it.'"
"And you stayed." It wasn't a question. I could see the answer in every line of his body, in the way he looked at this land like it was part of him, like his blood and bone were woven into the very soil.
"I stayed." Reid's voice was rough, thick with emotion he wasn't trying to hide. His dark eyes found mine, burning with something fierce and tender. "Worked myself half to death for five years. Paid off his debts. Rebuilt what he'd broken. Made this place into something worth having instead of something to be ashamed of."
He paused, his gaze sweeping over the land below—the pastures, the cattle, the buildings that had been falling apart when he'd inherited them and now stood sturdy and well-maintained.
"Someone gave me a chance when I didn't deserve it." His voice was barely above a whisper, raw with a vulnerability I'd never heard from him before. His dark eyes returned to mine, holding me captive with their intensity. "Hank saw something in me that I couldn't see in myself. He believed I could be morethan my father's son, more than my own worst impulses. And I spent years trying to prove him right."
My throat was tight, my eyes burning with tears I refused to let fall.
"You did prove him right." My voice came out rough, cracked around the edges, but fierce with conviction. I reached across the space between our horses, my hand finding his where it rested on his thigh, my fingers curling around his. His skin was warm, rough with calluses, and I felt him startle slightly at the contact before his hand turned to grip mine back. "Look at what you've built. Look at the people you've helped. You're not your father, Reid. You're nothing like him."
Something cracked in his expression—a wall falling, a door opening—and for a moment I saw him, really saw him. Not the steady Head Alpha, not the stoic rancher, but the wounded boy who'd clawed his way out of darkness and built something beautiful from the wreckage of his father's destruction.
"Neither are you." His voice was low, intense, his dark eyes burning into mine with a ferocity that made my breath catch. His hand tightened around mine, his thumb tracing a rough path across my knuckles. "Whatever made you run —that's not who you are. That's what you survived."
The words landed in my chest and took root, burrowing deep into places that had been dark and hollow for so long.
"How do you know?" The question came out broken, desperate, echoing the one I'd asked Nolan days ago. "How can you be so sure?"
"Because I see you." Reid's voice was simple, certain, leaving no room for doubt. He released my hand, but only so he could swing down from Thunder's back, his boots hitting the ground with a solid thump. He moved to stand beside Copper, looking up at me with those dark, steady eyes, one hand reaching up to rest on my knee. "The way you are with Hope. The way you workwithout being asked. The way you look at Kol when he's being ridiculous, like you can't decide whether to laugh or throttle him." A small smile curved his lips, softening his weathered face. "I see who you really are, Aster. And she's worth a hundred of whoever you think you have to be."
I couldn't breathe. Couldn't think. Could only stare down at this man who'd shared his deepest wounds with me and then turned around and seen right through mine.
"Come on." His voice was gentler now, his hand leaving my knee to offer me help dismounting. His dark eyes were warm, patient, giving me time to collect myself. "There's something I want to show you."
I took his hand and let him help me down from the saddle, hyperaware of every point of contact—his fingers wrapped around mine, his other hand steadying my waist as my feet hit the ground, his scent surrounding me as I landed close enough to feel the heat radiating from his body.
He didn't step back. Neither did I.
For a long moment, we just stood there, his hand still on my waist, mine still gripping his, the horses standing patient behind us and the whole world spread out at our feet. His scent was everywhere—whiskey and woodsmoke and something deeper, something primal that made my blood sing and my Omega purr with recognition.
This is him, something inside me whispered. This is yours.
"The sunset." Reid's voice came out rough, strained, and when I looked up I found his jaw tight, his nostrils flaring slightly, his dark eyes blazing with barely contained heat. "I wanted to show you the sunset from up here. It's the best view on the property."
