Rein In (Willow Bay Stables #3)(7)

My head titled to the side as I watched him yank up his pants a little more, and I bit back a grin. He looked like a pint-sized thug. A knock-off version of the real thing—not that I’d ever actually seen the real thing—and it was kind of adorable in a weird way.

It was like he’d walked off the set of The Godfather.

“Sure.” I gave a half-smile and watched as he reached in to grab the bag.

He lifted, then he stumbled backwards a few paces.

“Are you okay?” I asked, my eyebrows pulling together in concern.

The boy-man didn’t look like he’d lifted much of anything in his lifetime, let alone a heavy bag of feed.

Sweat trickled from his brow, and he flashed me a set of teeth that included one gold-cap incisor. “I got it, baby girl.”

“Lift with your legs, not your back,” I encouraged him as he wobbled back and forth on the spot.

He scrunched up his nose and started to bend his knees, but instead of bending, they buckled under the weight of the grain, and he fell splat on the paving stones.

“Idiot.” Josh laughed, and I looked up to see him assessing us with vague and mortified disinterest.

Kneeling down, I looked at the boy-man sprawled out underneath the feedbag and shook my head. “Are you okay?”

There was some mumbling before his head poked out from the side of the bag. “Right as rain, baby girl.” He grinned.

I laughed and took pity on him. Standing, I used my foot and rolled the bag off his chest and onto the ground beside him.

“Need a hand?” I asked, offering mine.

He lay there for a moment longer before reaching up and interlocking his fingers with mine. I hauled him up into the air, shocked that he actually weighed so little, probably less than I did.

“I’m Glitch,” he said, still holding on to my hand.

Shaking his in return, I smiled. “I’m Aurora. Are you sure you’re okay?”

He let my hand go and dusted some of the dirt from his behind. “I’ve been in worse tumbles than that, baby girl.”

“No, he hasn’t,” Josh deadpanned sarcastically.

Flicking my eyes over to him, I scowled. “Five minutes and lunch is over.”

He grunted and went back to scribbling furiously on the paper.

“Well, he’s a real peach.” Glitch scrunched up his nose in Josh’s direction and stuck out his tongue.

I bit back a laugh. “You should see him on a bad day.”

Glitch shuddered and shook his head. “I’ll take your word for it.”

Wiping the sweat from my brow, I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. My eyes lifted above Glitch’s head to see a man leaning against the outside of the barn.

I’d never seen him before.

He was tall, his black jeans so ripped that nearly both his entire knees were exposed. The faded Harvard shirt he wore was cut off at the sleeves and dipped low enough on the sides that you could see some of his chest. He moved smoothly, his arms crossing over his chest, and my heart pounded a little in my head.

Stubble ran across his hard jaw, and the lean muscles in his arms flexed in the heat. It was hot out, yet he didn’t look sweaty at all. His black hair was still wet and messy, like he’d just had a shower, and his eyes were hidden behind mirrored aviators.

I felt my pulse skitter in my throat.

“Who is that?” I blurted.

Following my line of sight, Glitch looked over his shoulder.

“Oh, that’s Crow.” His mouth tipped up in the corner on a half-grin.

“His name is Crow?” I asked, baffled.

The man bent one of his legs, resting his black motorcycle boot flat on the wall and cocked his head to the side.

He was definitely studying us.

Glitch rested his forearms on the edge of my pickup bed and laughed. “’Bout the same as my mom gave me the name Glitch.”

I rolled my eyes. “So why do they call him Crow?”

For some reason, I couldn’t help but need to know. The man was a little like an accident on the freeway, you were scared to look but you did anyway.

I hoped that Glitch wouldn’t read too much into my nosiness.

“Probably on account of the fact that he don’t talk much.” Glitch shrugged. “That, and he’s only ever wearin’ black and lurkin’ around in the shadows.”

“Hmm,” I murmured.

Glitch’s eyes moved from the man in black to me, but I couldn’t take my eyes off him.

His full lips curled up in one corner. It wasn’t a smile or interest, but it was something. Then he pushed off from the wall, and he was gone again.

Black had never looked hotter in spring than it did on him.





STILLNESS, IT’S A BITCH.

You think after eight years behind bars, you’d learn to be still.

You don’t.

It’s like a nightmare on repeat, and when you wake up, you realize the world moved on without you.

I’ve been here almost two weeks and I still don’t feel normal. I’m not sure I’ll ever get the feeling of normalcy back in my bones. When you spend that long locked up, you learn to live that way, in that society of regimented regime and a bedtime. That becomes your normal. So much so that integrating back into the world afterwards seems nearly impossible.