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TJ climbed into the truck and waited until Skye had closed up the trailer and slid into the passenger seat next to him.

‘Fuck, it’s cold,’ was the first thing she said. ‘I thought you were supposed to crank the heat.’

‘Skye—’

‘Jesus, TJ – turn on the truck.’

‘Hey,’ he said quietly, cutting her off.

Skye, sensing his dread, fell quiet. Her eyes searched his face, waiting.

TJ picked the rose up from where he’d left it on the seat between them. For a single moment, Skye’s eyes widened, but not with fear – with pleasure.

‘No, baby – it’s not from me.’

Her face fell. The flush of pleasure faded, leaving her bone-white. ‘Holden?’

TJ nodded.

She took the rose from him, her hand shaking.

TJ stayed quiet as she read the note, and even though he wanted to shout and rage, he didn’t. He wanted to be calm and strong. For her.

But, Skye, always a fucking surprise, just folded the note and tucked it into the pocket of her heavy jacket. She raised the rose to her nose, inhaled lightly. ‘He’s not going to use something beautiful to scare me,’ she said quietly. ‘Not anymore. Never again.’ She grinned at him. ‘I already destroyed a perfectly good saddle.’

It wasn’t the response he’d been expecting. But then again, it seldom was when it came to Skye. TJ leaned over the space between them, and when she turned her head, he took her lips in a fierce kiss.

By the time they broke apart, they were both out of breath.

TJ started the truck. ‘Did you read the part about Smokey?’ he asked. When Skye frowned, he regurgitated the letter: ‘I was sad to hear about Smoking Barrel’s passing.’

‘He thinks she’s dead?’

‘Yup. Which means—’

‘Whoever’s working for him isn’t telling him everything,’ Skye finished.

‘Ford said Smokey’s wound was mostly superficial,’ TJ pointed out. ‘I’m not sure what we can conclude from that, but it’s something to think about.’

TJ linked his fingers with hers.

Skye cranked the heat.

They turned back towards the fairgrounds, the silence between them stretching comfortably, and when they got back to their RV spot, they fell into their respective tasks without a word.

It was nice, TJ thought. Domestic – even if Holden was on both their minds.

But it was only when he let himself back into the trailer that the immensity of his feelings for Skye took him under. She’d de-thorned the rose and put it in a glass of water, so that its stem stretched up to proudly display the fat, black bloom on the end.

It took someone truly special to take such an ugly gift and nurture her own meaning from it. For the first time ever, TJ allowed himself to wonder what might have happened if he’d let Skye stay after his accident. She might have been the difference he’d needed, might have given him the fight he hadn’t had for himself. She might have taken the ugly gift he’d been given and turned it into something different, something manageable. At the very least, she would have made the hard days easier to bear. He could acknowledge that, even though he was glad he’d spared her those two years.

It was no surprise then, that, with that thought on his mind, when Skye opened the trailer door and said, ‘You ready for your physio?’ TJ actually laughed. She turned from hanging her hat up to look at him. ‘What?’

‘Do you know when I first realized I was in love with you?’

Skye didn’t reply. She just stood there, frozen to the spot. So, TJ went to her. He closed that space. ‘It was the moment you walked out of my hospital room. I watched you go, and I realized that I didn’t want you to hurt, that it killed me to know I’d caused you pain.’ He thought back. ‘I tried to get up to go after you, and I fell. And I couldn’t stand up. So, I just lay there on the cold floor, waiting for someone to come find me. And all I could think was that it wasn’t fair, to give you any more promises when I couldn’t even fucking stand on my own two feet.

‘But I missed you,’ he said. ‘I mourned for what I knew we could have been to one another had we had more time.’