Seth, another one of Ironhorse’s cowboys, falls into step beside me as I head for the bar. “You good?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say automatically.
The bar is three deep, but the guy behind it catches my eye almost immediately.
“Holy shit,” I say, leaning forward. “Theo?”
Theo looks up, blinks once, and then his face breaks into a grin. “Well, I’ll be damned. Heard through the grapevine that the prodigal Ludlow son came home.”
I snort. “Not much of a secret.”
He sets two beers in front of the patrons to my right, then steps to me. We bump knuckles over the bar.
“Didn’t know you were running this place,” I say, nodding around us.
“Two years now,” he says. “Dad finally retired. Took some convincing, but he’s happier on the lake, yelling at the fish, than he is here, yelling at drunks every night.”
“Good for him.”
“What’s your poison tonight?” he asks.
“Three beers. Whatever you have on draft, but none of that light shit.”
He laughs. “Got it. First round’s on the house.”
I shake my head. “You don’t have to—”
“Already done,” he says. “Welcome back.”
I thank him as he sets the glasses in front of me. I grab the beers, and Seth and I weave our way back through the crowd toward the pool tables.
Allen’s already chalking a cue.
We set the beers down and claim a couple of stools and a pub table nearby. The guys fall into easy conversation—work, Darby’s orneriness, winter coming faster than anyone wants to admit.
I sip my beer and let my gaze wander.
That’s when I see her.
Shelby.
She’s on the dance floor, and it takes me a second to really register what I’m looking at—not because I don’t recognize her, but because my brain hasn’t quite caught up to the fact that she looks like that tonight.
Curve-clinging cream top. Brown skirt with fringe that swings when she moves. Boots that were made for dancing, not riding. Her hair is loose and flowing down her back.
She’s dancing with the farrier—the guy she introduced me to the other day. Dixon Fisher. Nice-enough guy. Solid handshake. Hell of a white smile.
He’s trying to keep up with her, bless his heart, but Shelby dances like she rides, like the music is part of her, thumpingunder her skin. She moves without thinking—hips rolling, shoulders loose, laughter bright as she spins away and back again.
Charli swoops in from the side, all wild energy and liquor-fueled confidence, and what looks like their younger sister—Harleigh—joins them. The three Storm women surround Dixon like a tornado of limbs and swinging hair.
They’re clearly a few drinks in. They stumble, recover, laugh harder.
Shelby looks carefree. Like she’s having the time of her life.
Something tightens in my chest, sharp and unexpected. The way she smiles at Fisher. Easy and without the cautious edge she always uses with me.
I don’t even realize I’m staring until Seth nudges me with his elbow.
