"Nothing to say."
She studied me as we got out, those brown eyes that had once looked at me like I hung the moon now holding something closer to resignation. We grabbed tools from the truck bed—post-hole digger, wire stretcher, hammer, staples. Our hands reached for the wire spool at the same time, fingers almost touching before we both pulled back like we'd been burned.
"Last night with the calf, you were almost... nice," she said, hefting the tools with practiced ease. "Now you're back to growling. What happened?"
"Reality happened." I drove the first fence post into the ground with more force than necessary; the impact jarring up my arms. "Last night was just work. Today's just work. Tomorrow will be just work until you finish your contract and leave."
I saw the words hit, saw her flinch slightly before her chin came up in that stubborn way I used to love. It was harsh, but I needed to be. I was already falling down the slippery slope of letting myself love her again, and I couldn’t afford the heartbreak when she inevitably went back to Dallas…andMark.
"What crawled up your ass since I left you this morning?" She dropped the wire stretcher with a deliberate clang that made the horses in the nearby pasture look up. "We actually had a decent moment last night. We worked together, saved that calf, and foronce you didn't look at me like I was something you scraped off your boot."
"My mistake," I said, driving another post with unnecessary violence, sweat already soaking through my shirt. "Won't happen again."
"Your mistake?" Her voice rose, sharp enough to cut. "Being a decent human being for five minutes was a mistake?"
"Being anything with you is a mistake."
The words came out harsher than I intended, but I didn't take them back. Couldn't. If I let her in again, even a little, she'd destroy me. And I was barely held together as it was, walking around this ranch like a functional person when really I was just scar tissue in the shape of a man.
She stood there, hands on her hips, color rising in her cheeks like a storm building. The sun behind her turned her into something mythical, all fire and fury. "You know what? You're right. This is a mistake. Me being here, trying to help your ranch, pretending like we can be civil. It's all a huge fucking mistake."
“Finally, something we agree on.”
Her eyes snapped to mine, fury flashing hot. “You’re such an asshole,” she bit out, grabbing the wire stretcher again. She yanked it hard, muscles flexing beneath her shirt, her ponytail whipping against her back. “You act like you’re the only one who got hurt. Like you’re the only one who lost something.”
“Iamthe only one who lost something! I got left with a fucking note that said nothing and a necklace I’d given you not even eight hours earlier.” My voice rose before I could stop it, rough and raw. The old anger surged up, tasting like rust and whiskey, burning through my chest. “I’m the only one who spent months wondering what the hell I did wrong. What I could’ve done differently. If I’d been enough, if I’d been better, if I’d beenmore?—”
“Maybe you couldn’t have done anything different!” she shouted, spinning to face me. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes wet but blazing. “Maybe it had nothing to do with you.”
“Right,” I snarled. “You just woke up one day and decided to blow up our entire future for fun.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Because youwon’t tell me!” The words ripped out of me like a shot, echoing across the open pasture. Crows scattered from a nearby fencepost. The only sound left was our ragged breathing and the low hum of the wind through the grass. “Fourteen years, Ivy. Fourteen years, and you still can’t give me a real explanation. Just more cryptic bullshit about ‘doing what you had to do.’”
She turned away, shoulders shaking. For a heartbeat, I thought she’d walk off. But when she spoke again, her voice was cold and sharp enough to draw blood. “You want an explanation? Fine. You were suffocating me. All your plans, your dreams, your perfect little future mapped out—did you ever once ask whatIwanted?”
The words hit harder than a fist. My hand went slack, the fence post driver slipping from my grip and landing in the dirt with a dull thud.
“You said you wanted it too,” I managed, my voice barely more than a rasp. “Every plan we made, you were right there beside me, building it with me. The house, the kids, the whole damn life?—”
“Maybe I was eighteen and didn’t know better!” she cut in, her voice breaking halfway through. “Maybe I realized I wanted more than Copper Creek could give me.”
Silence fell like a hammer. The wind died. Even the cattle in the distance seemed to stop moving.
We just stood there—a few feet apart, years between us—both breathing hard, both bleeding from old wounds we’d never let heal.
"More than me, you mean."
She looked away, jaw clenched, her profile sharp as glass against the burning sky. "If that's how you want to put it."
"You're lying.” She had to be, or I wouldn’t survive it. There had to be another reason like Liam said. But I neededherto say it, to trust me again.
"Am I? Look at what I've accomplished. Look at where I am now." She gestured at herself, all city polish even in work clothes. "You think I could have done any of that stuck here, playing ranch wife, popping out babies for you?"
The cruelty of it, the calculated way she reduced our dreams to something small and pathetic, made my vision red at the edges.
"Playing ranch wife," I repeated slowly, tasting each word like poison. "That's what you think you would have been doing?”
