Rein In (Willow Bay Stables #3)(28)

I felt like my body might break in two just so one half could be with him as he left.

My fingers pressed against my lips where he’d only just been, and it was so far beyond impossible to deny myself the smile that grew there.

When my breathing began to even out, I busied myself putting the flowers in a vase, mostly because I needed my riding boots or else I’d have left them there. Then, I tore myself away from waiting daydreams to muck horse poo in the heat with Josh.

Life, as a girl, really had some terribly comical punishments when all you wanted to do was spend the day with a boy.

Despite my fear that the day would pass slowly in anticipation for my date with Rhys, it actually went by rather quickly, and considering it was with Josh, remarkably painless as well. We’d finished the afternoon off with a trail ride around the property and for once, Josh seemed like maybe he didn’t hate it so much after all.

This only lifted my spirits higher. To work with a boy like Josh and see even the slightest change in him during a short period of time was a monumental success.

Successes like those were of the kind Rhys encouraged me to celebrate.

They were my accomplishments.

I’d eaten dinner faster than I had ever eaten in all my years on this earth. I hadn’t even waited for my hair to dry after my shower before I left to meet him.

I needed to see him.

I wore my yellow sundress, the one Rhys had asked for, and wandered through the trees to the riding ring where I’d first heard his voice. I hoped that he’d meant here and not the barn where I’d heard him reading.

It had only been one word, a pained one, when he scolded Josh, but in the back riding ring was the first time I had heard him.

Just through the clearing, I saw something bright with lights in the center of the arena and standing outside of it was Rhys.

His features were riddled with nerves.

“Do you like it?” he asked as I walked through the gate.

I had barely been able to keep walking at the sight of what he had done for me.

In the center of the riding arena, using the poles and stands used to erect horse jumps, Rhys had built a fort, an honest to goodness fort.

It was made of blankets of all colors, some with patterns and some just white. They hung everywhere, making up the walls and the ceiling. He left only one side open, the side that looked over the barn where the sun would set in a few hours.

It had likely taken him all afternoon to keep the sheets from blowing away in the wind.

The thought of him chasing sheets through the hills was a magnificent one.

As though this wouldn’t be enough, with quite possibly the longest extension cord in the world, Rhys had strung a single strand of twinkle lights from the roof of the fort.

I started to cry.

I couldn’t explain why, and it was only when he winced that I started to run toward him.

He caught me mid-air, spinning us a little before setting my feet back on the ground.

“Did I do something wrong?” The boyhood in his manly voice was terribly self-conscious of his vulnerable act. I could feel it in the way he cupped my face with his hands.

“There are books inside,” he rushed out. “Just some that I found in The Shed, nothing special but...”

His eyes were violently scanning mine for reassurance.

“I thought maybe you could pick one.” He rested his forehead on mine. “I could read it to you until the sun sets.”

My voice finally broke through the tears. “It’s p-p-perfect, R-Rhys,” I stammered.

The sound of his heart rejoicing in his chest soothed the tender ache in mine.

“You look beautiful in that dress,” he whispered.

The wind blew by, and the wet ends of my hair caused a momentary shiver to fall over my skin.

“When you walk my way in that dress”—he swallowed against something in his throat—“I feel like a man, rich with a thousand private sunrises.”

My soul crept out and wrapped itself up in his.

“Will you show me the books?” I asked.

He nodded, taking my hand in his.

We ducked under a chevron-printed sheet, falling forward onto the floor of pillows Rhys had built beneath us.

It was like something out of a seventeen-year-old boy’s heart built with a man’s hands.

Something built for me by him.

I thumbed through the old paperbacks in a pile beside a pitcher of tea, and when I read the title, I knew it was the book he would read to me today.

Picking up the book, I hid the cover against my chest and turned toward him slowly. “I just figured, since we had a theme…”

His smile enveloped the entire room when I showed him the cover.

Lying down, he put an arm under his head, the book folded open in his other hand, and as he started to read, I rested my head just above the beat of his heart.

“Black Beauty,” his voice began, and my eyes fluttered shut. “By Anna Sewell.”

Rhys read to me, and I was sure that the sound of his voice was the only comfort I’d ever need.

He read as the sun set.

He read as the air cooled with the night.

He read until the last lines of the book left his lips.

“My troubles are all over, and I am at home; and often before I am quite awake, I fancy I am still in the orchard at Birtwick, standing with my old friends under the apple-trees.”