"Yes." I stopped in front of her. "I'm also—" I stopped. Pressed my jaw together. "I'm keeping up with a twenty-oneyear old woman. I'm seventeen years older than you. I've got a bad knee and I wake up wrong half the mornings of my life and I've been to a war that you were three years old for." My voice came out rough. "And now you're pregnant and you want to keep it and you're standing here telling me you're not asking me for anything, which is the most Haven thing you've ever said to me?—"
"Wyatt—"
"I don't want you shackled to me because of a baby." The words came out raw. "That's what I'm saying. I don't want you to be twenty-five and look at your life and realize?—"
"That I'm with the man I've wanted since I was sixteen?" Her voice cracked on it, just slightly. "That I'm raising a baby with someone I'm in love with?"
The barn went quiet.
She closed her eyes briefly. Opened them. Like she hadn't meant to say it quite like that but wasn't going to take it back either.
"I have known what I wanted for a long time," she said. "You keep trying to protect me from my own choices and I need you to hear me when I tell you—I am not a kid. I am not confused. I know exactly what I'm choosing and I'm choosing it anyway." Her jaw set. "The question is whether you want it too. Not whether I'm allowed to."
I looked at her.
Stared.
Wanted to sweep her into my arms and kiss her senseless, but also to hide my face in shame that I’d stolen her fucking future.
I didn’t get to do either.
Because the barn door banged open.
Dakota came in fast, hair mussed and pushed back, out of breath. He took one look at me, one look at Haven, and his stride faltered for half a second.
"Sorry," he said, not sounding sorry at all. "But we've got a situation."
I stared at him. "Dakota?—"
"Two puppies caught in the fence down by the south pasture." He jerked his head toward the door. "Whole litter running loose, no mama anywhere. Neto thinks a coyote got her."
I rubbed a hand over my face.
"How many puppies?" Haven said.
I looked at her. She'd already shifted—shoulders back, focused, the conversation folded away somewhere behind her eyes. Already in work mode. Already thinking about what needed doing.
"Five? Six?" Dakota said. "Two of 'em are stuck bad. Barbed wire."
"I'll get the kit," she said, and walked past both of us toward the supply room without waiting to be asked.
Dakota watched her go.
The supply room door swung shut behind her.
“You good?” Dakota asked.
Thank fuck he wasn’t being a snarky little shit. I didn’t think I could handle it.
"I'm fine,” I muttered.
He nodded slowly. Didn't believe me, and didn't push it, which was the best thing about Dakota when he wasn't being an idiot. He knew when to leave something alone.
"Puppies need us," he said.
"Yeah." I grabbed my jacket off the stall door. "Let's go."
FOURTEEN
