“Mornin’,” I echo, tipping my hat out of habit.
He stands next to me, reaching over the stall to scratch Midnight behind the ear. “Feel that?”
I lift my face. There’s a shift in the air, still dry, but the kind of dry that comes before something breaks. The smell is faint, almost imaginary, the promise of rain whispering from somewhere far off.
“Storm’s comin’,” I say.
Wyatt nods. “Heard the same from Emmett. Said the clouds were building over Dusty Spur last night.”
“Could use the rain,” I mutter, glancing toward the pasture.
The grass is too pale. The air too still. Makes my skin itch with unease.
“We could,” he agrees. “Though lightning’s a real problem.”
I roll my shoulders, trying to shake off the tension crawling along my spine. “Let’s hope it’s rain first, thunder second.”
Wyatt shoots me a look that says he’s hoping the exact same thing. Then he pats Midnight’s neck and steps back.
“You sleep at all last night?”
The question catches me sideways, sharp enough to make my jaw clench. He asks it softly, though.
He already knows the answer and isn’t judging me for it. Wyatt’s good at that.
“Enough,” I lie.
He doesn’t call me on it. Just nods, the way you nod at a skittish animal you don’t want to spook.
“We’ll keep an eye on the weather,” he says, reaching for the clipboard near the tack room. “If we need to move the herd, better to know early.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Good plan.”
But my mind’s already drifting, back to the dream, back to the sound of Luke’s laughter turning into a scream, back to the way the world fell apart in one second I couldn’t change. Couldn’t fix.
Couldn’t save.
I grip the stall door hard enough for the old wood to creak.
Wyatt glances at me, worry flickering in his eyes, but he doesn’t push. He never does. Instead, he just gives me that small, understanding nod, the kind that says he’s here if I need him.
“Storm or not,” I say, forcing myself calm, “we’ll handle it.”
A breath of cool drifts into the barn, stirring dust motes in the morning light. It smells almost of rain.
Wyatt smiles faintly. “Yeah. We will.”
I tip my hat, hum under my breath again, and get back to the horses, back to the work that keeps everything quiet in my mind. Back to the routine that holds me together.
Because storms come whether you’re ready or not.
CHAPTER THREE
Abilene
Saturday
The morning hum is different today.
