Rein In (Willow Bay Stables #3)(26)

“You’ve had it in your bag all this time?” I asked her.

It had been weeks since my hands trembled when I wrapped her in that horse blanket.

She knelt on the seat next to me, and her smile was bashful. “Yes,” she answered. “I was hoping you might read it to me someday.”

My fingers curled around the spine of the book, and I flipped it open to the page I’d been on that night in the barn.

“Okay,” I whispered.

She lay down, resting the back of her head in my lap and closed her eyes.

One of my hands sprawled out on her stomach where she placed her fingers over mine, and the other held the paperback as I read.

And I read.

And I read.

We sat there on the side of the road in the middle of summer for hours while I read. Sometimes I wondered if she’d fallen asleep. Her breathing would become so even, so still, but I never stopped reading.

I didn’t stop until the very last page was turned.

“Your voice is quite possibly my favourite sound.” She smiled, eyes still closed.

It was the first time she’d spoken since I’d begun reading.

Leaning forward, I kissed her on the forehead. “It’s time to go home, angel.”

“I know,” she whispered. “Just a few more minutes.”

I envied that so incredibly much. The way she lay soundly in her stillness. It was like the entire world was hers and the rest of us were just passing through.

It was well past dinner when we finally returned to the stable. No one had seemed to notice that we’d been gone much longer than it would have ever taken to run errands, but I imagined that was due to Aurora’s reputation and not mine.

She stood, fidgeting at the back of her tailgate. “Walk me home?” she asked.

“Of course.” I turned toward the main house and nearly jumped from my skin when her small hand slid into my much larger one.

She was holding my hand.

I stared at our interlocked hands and then at her. “Aren’t you worried that…”

It was one thing for her to kiss me in the middle of a town where no one knew what I’d done or who I was but here, everyone knew the kind of person she was with.

“Let them look.” She smiled. “I’m not ashamed of you.”

It was then I felt the growing pains in my heart. It grew so much, so quickly, that I almost tripped from the sensation.

I guess angels really do fall sometimes, and this one had fallen right into me.

We reached the back door to the main house, and I pulled her to me. “Thank you,” I said, wrapping my arms around her shoulders.

“For what?” she asked.

“Thank you for having enough light for both of us.” I kissed her forehead. “I didn’t realize how much I’d missed the sun.”

Her lips grazed mine. “I’ll be your light anytime you need it, Rhys.”

We kissed for what felt like nearly a thousand times before I watched her walk inside that house, and I missed her the moment she did.

That was the thing about the sun—you missed it when it was gone.

Grant came to The Shed later that evening to inform us that Dirt had been given a first and second strike. “This isn’t the place for fourth and fifth chances, boys.” Grant had growled. “It’s a second chance. Don’t f*ck it up.”

If Dirt missed curfew again, or broke the terms of his parole in any other way, it would be the end of his time at Equine for Hearts and he would be back in jail before the sun rose on the next day.

The thought of that being me almost crippled my heart.

I could never go back to days where she didn’t exist.

I thought there was a good chance I’d die first.





THERE ARE MOMENTS WITH SOME people that turn the world, as you once knew it, on its axis.

It wasn’t one moment for us. It was a series of little moments.

The moment I saw him.

The moment I first heard his voice.

The moment he wrapped me in a dirty horse blanket.

The moment I sat listening to him breathing in my truck.

The moment I kissed him.

The moment he ran away.

You get the picture, I’m sure, but that was Rhys.

There were so many moments.

Every moment I had accumulated with him in the last two and a half months turned my world upside down in the most wonderful way.

He was raw in the same way a painting at the museum was honest. Nothing about his heart was for show. It was all real. In whatever way he chose to reveal his soul to you, you could rest easy knowing that what you saw was the real deal.

Rhys was proud of my heart, but I was in awe of his. It made for quite a beautiful recipe of getting lost in someone.

Twirling the milk into my tea, I sighed at the memory of the kisses we’d shared.

There had been so many kisses in the two weeks since that afternoon in town, and I was sure I could kiss him for the rest of my life and never tire of it.

“Josh’s going to be here any minute, Aurora.” Grant interrupted my daydream and looked at me funny as he poured coffee into his travel mug. He frowned and leaned against the counter. “Are you all right? You look flushed.”

Looking down at the time on my phone, I practically shot out of the clouds I’d been floating on and jumped off the stool to the breakfast bar.