Something Wilder
Christina Lauren
For Violet:
You asked for a book with horses.
We also included a woman who is brave and smart and industrious, a lot like someone else we know.
We love you very much.
Author’s Note
JUST BEYOND MOAB, Utah, Canyonlands National Park is one of the most spectacular places in the continental United States, with high desert vistas spliced by the Colorado River, Green River, and endless serpentine tributaries. Lucky visitors get an eyeful of wide blue sky and the spectacular view of red rock stretching for miles and miles. There are areas within the park that are remote and nearly impassable, and there are other areas that are hikeable, drivable, and wildly enjoyable for tourists.
After months of research and visits, we both became intimately familiar with this landscape and terrain. We even hired an expert expedition guide to draw us maps of a possible treasure hunt. But, dear reader, sometimes story must come before accuracy, and so—despite all that we’ve learned about the geography of this area… we made up a lot of stuff anyway. In some places, we have condensed distances; in others we’ve created settings and structures where none exist.
All this to say: we wrote this book to be a fun, swoon-filled escape from the real world, not to serve as a guide to your own adventure. (If you follow our route, you will die, lol.) Of course, we’d love to think Leo and Lily’s love story will inspire you to get out in the wild and blaze new trails, but even if you’re happier staying curled up in your reading nook, we hope we’ve given you one hell of a good time.
With love,
Lauren & Christina
Prologue
Laramie, Wyoming
October, Ten Years Ago
LILY WILDER’S BOOTS crunched through smooth gravel as she made her way from the barn to the lodge, surveying her favorite place on earth. Behind her, horses stepped up to slurp from the water tank, thirsty after a long night out in the pasture. Smoke drifted from the chimney of the big house and into the clear gray sky. The dawn was cool, the sun just breaking over the mountains.
She’d already been up for hours.
On the porch, a long shadow waited for her, holding two mugs. Her heart gave a heavy, infatuated jab at the sight of Leo—sleep-rumpled and grinning, bundled up in sweats and a fleece. Without question, this was how she wanted to start every morning; she still couldn’t believe that from today on, she would. Lily jogged up the three rickety steps, stretching to fit her smile against his, feeling like it had been days, not hours, since she’d last touched him. His lips were warm, soft against her wind-chilled ones. The heat of his fingers on her hip ignited bottle rockets inside her chest.
“Where is he?” Lily asked, wondering if her father had left the ranch without saying goodbye. It wouldn’t be the first time, but it would be the first time she didn’t care.
Leo pressed a warm mug into her hand and nodded to the caretaker’s cabin across the river. “He walked over the bridge to Erwin’s,” he said. “Saying goodbye.”
Was it odd that she had no idea where her father was headed or how long he’d be gone? If it was, Lily didn’t let the thought penetrate very deeply; more demanding was the way her pulse banged out a celebratory blast of a song: her life was finally starting, and somehow, this summer, while she’d learned how to manage nearly every aspect of the ranch, she’d also fallen in love. It was a love that surprised her—anchored and assured, clothes-shredding and fevered. She’d spent the first nineteen years of her life being tolerated and planned around, but here, with Leo, she was finally the center of someone’s world. She’d never smiled so much, laughed so freely, or dared to want so ferociously. The closest she’d felt before was saddling her horse and racing across her family’s land. Those moments were fleeting, though; Leo had promised he was here to stay.
She tilted her chin to gaze up into his face. He’d inherited his Irish father’s build and his Japanese American mother’s features, but the soul inside was all his own. Lily’d never known anyone as quietly, firmly grounded as Leo Grady. She still couldn’t believe this steadfast man was willing to uproot everything for her.
She’d asked him “Are you sure?” a hundred times. Wilder Ranch was her dream; she knew better than to expect running a guest ranch year-round to be anyone else’s. It certainly hadn’t been her father’s, though at least he’d put in the bare minimum to keep it solvent. For Lily’s mother, the ranch was just another thing she gladly left behind. Sometimes Lily felt like she’d spent every day of her life waiting for the moment when she could make this ranch her forever. And now it was here, with Leo to boot.
“I’m sure, Lil.” Leo’s free arm came around her shoulder, guiding her right up into his side, where he tucked her close and bent to kiss her temple. “You sure you want a rookie like me here, though?”
“Hell yes.” The words were loud in the quiet morning. In the distance, her new foal whinnied back. Leo looked at her with adoring eyes. He was new to ranching, true, but he was also a natural with the horses, capable in a million tiny ways, and a convenient top-hook-in-the-tack-room kind of tall. But none of that was why she wanted him there. She wanted him there because Leo Grady was undeniably hers, the first hers she’d ever had.