Him.
That would always be enough. It was simply fantastic that they were on this journey together, him supporting her dreams, while she supported his purpose.
She watched Break swing up onto Jet’s back, barehanded and steady, olive against white fencing, and smiled. Rising, she decided all this could wait. The sun was shining, and her man was showing off for her out there. His glances toward her office window gave him away. Ah, the charming bastard thought he could fool her, or maybe he was just being charming.
She wouldn’t put it past him. With a welling of love and affection for both horse and man, she stepped into the sunlight. The look on his face as she approached was wonderful, but what they had together? That was priceless.
He caught her wrist before she could take two steps toward the pasture.
“Kelly—”
She barely got the word out before he leaned down from Jet’s back and hauled her up in one smooth motion, settling her in front of him like she weighed nothing. But his hands lingered a fraction too long on her waist, his fingers flexing slightly against the fabric of her shirt, micro-tension, a reflex, like he was still bracing for her to pull away.
“Hey!” She laughed, breathless, hands gripping his forearm. “What are you?—”
“Relax,” he murmured against her ear, the words warm and low, but his voice had a slight rasp to it, the kind that comes when you’ve been holding your breath too long. “Trust me.”
Jet shifted beneath them, a restless ripple of muscle, then moved into an easy canter, cutting across the pasture toward the narrow path that led to the dunes. The wind lifted her hair, carried salt and sunlight and the distant rush of tide, but beneath it, she felt the steady, controlled thrum of Jet’s stride, and the even, deliberate press of Breakneck’s chest against her spine. His arm around her waist wasn’t just holding her…it was anchoring him.
They rode the path without urgency. No fences. No racing. Just open stretch and horizon, the kind of quiet that only exists when two people were too full of unspoken things to fill the space with noise.
When the ocean came into view, endless blue against white sand, the sky bleeding into water at the edge of the world, he slowed Jet to a walk, then stopped near a quiet curve of shoreline where dunes rose like protection on either side. The wind here was stronger, whipping off the water, tugging at his shirt, flattening her blouse against her ribs. The air smelled like salt and wild grass and the promise of something new.
He nudged her gently.
“Turn around.”
She shifted carefully in the saddle until she faced him, knees over his thighs. Jet stood patient, head lowered, ears flicking at the sound of the waves. The wind was louder here, louder than the silence between them.
His expression wasn’t teasing now.
It was steady.
Intent.
But she saw it, the slight tremor in his jaw, the way his eyes held hers like he was memorizing her face before he spoke. He reached behind her into the saddlebag.
Her pulse kicked hard.
“Kelly…”
He brought his hand forward, a small, velvet box resting against his palm.
Everything in her went quiet.
“You built your vision into something extraordinary,” he said, voice low but sure, though there was a crack in it, just one, like a stone splitting under pressure. “Not just the land. Not the brand. You built a life.” Her throat tightened. “Even better, you let me stand in it.” Jet flicked an ear, shifting weight beneath them. The ocean roared softly behind him, a constant, grounding rhythm. “I don’t want to visit your future, Blair,” he continued. “I want to build it with you. Every fence. Every fight. Every damn grant meeting.”
A sound escaped her, half surrender, half breath she’d been holding too long.
He flipped open the box.
The stone caught the sun first. Soft blush. Set low in platinum, clean lines, deliberate.
It was perfect. Of course it was.
He looked at her like she was the only fixed point in his world, the only thing that had ever been real enough to hold on to. “Marry me.”
Her eyes burned, but she refused to blink.
