Page 118 of Wilder

He didn’t look at me when I walked up. Didn’t speak, either. We simply stood there together for a minute, the wind tugging gently at our clothes while I lifted a leg up to rest on the bottom post and lean my weight against the top rail to mirror him.

Coming out here was a habit. I’d done so too often when checking up on Asher that it hadn’t occurred to me to avoid this part of the ranch at all costs to save myself from running into anyone while my chest was still split in two until it was already too late.

Now we were stuck. Trapped in this ugly, monstrous mess neither of us wanted to be in.

Eventually, I broke first. “Heard he made it home okay.”

Sully let out a slow exhale, eyes still fixed on the colts “I know. Laken told me this morning.”

A beat passed.

“He cried,” I said quietly, though I wasn’t sure why I was bringing it up. It wasn’t like it changed much. My throat tightened with the admission. “Tried to fight me on it, actually.”

Sully’s jaw flexed. “You know I didn’t ask for that. For you to send him packing. All I said was to put some distance between you two until your feelings cooled off.”

“I know,” I muttered, shifting my weight. “Figured I’d save us all the trouble and fast forward things. We both knew it was going to come down to that, anyway.”

There was no chance I’d be able to stop wanting Asher, even if he rejected me and drew that line in the sand between us again. I couldn’t—wouldn’t be able to.

I didn’t have it in me. My heart had latched onto him, drowned in that light of his until I was left coming out the other side of it a completely different man. No matter what, fate would always force Asher and I down this same path. Fighting it was prolonging the inevitable.

Another long silence stretched between us before Sully finally turned to look at me. His eyes weren’t angry, just a little sad. “Wilder... I owe you an apology.”

That shocked me.

His gaze didn’t waver. “I was out of line... Back at the house when I found out about you and Asher. I let my own shit get in the way, my own fears about what other people would think, when I should’ve been thinking about you two instead.”

I swallowed hard. “You had a right to be angry.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “I didn’t. Not like that. You didn’t deserve me coming at you like that or saying what I did about your daddy. It wasn’t true. Frankly, he’d hit me upside the head if he heard me talking shit like that.”

Without meaning to, a small, choked laugh escaped me.

A faint smile tugged at his lips. “I know Asher makes you happy. Fuck, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen you like that. I thought... I was protecting the both of you. I didn’t think it’d end up being like this.”

“But you were right,” I argued. “He is young. He doesn’t need to be getting tangled up in my shit when he should be off doing things normal kids his age do.”

Doing stupid shit with friends, going out to bars, hooking up with whoever he wanted with no strings attached or, fuck, going to college and using those brains for something more important like finance or tech.

Sully’s brow furrowed as he looked back toward the pasture. “What your Mama said after he left the house that day was right, Wilder. Asher’s a grown man, he makes his own choices. What happened between you two wasn’t an accident, right? I know you too well to see through whatever lies you’re trying to tell yourself. You can’t stand there and tell me you wouldn’t drop everything right now if he called and asked you to come get him.”

My lips parted to speak, though soon closed when nothing came out. Lying to him when we both knew that he was seeing right through me wouldn’t change things, even if I tried to deny it. Like Sully said, he knew me too well not to read between the lines of my bullshit.

He sighed again, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. “Accusing you of taking advantage of him wasn’t right, either, and I’m sorry for that, too.”

A sharp twist of hurt curled in my stomach. “I never would have. I care about him too much to ever cross a line like that if he didn’t show interest in the first place.”

“You’re right,” Sully agreed. “You also shouldn’t have had to let him go because you felt pressured to. That’s on me for pushing a wedge between you two when I found out.”

“Well, it’s done now.” I sighed.

Sully stared at me for a long moment before continuing on. “I’ve been thinking about it a lot. And... I realized I’m not mad at you. I was mad that things were changing. Relationships tend to cloud people’s judgment no matter how hard they try to not let them. I thought that’s what was happening and reacted out of fear.”

The rationale made sense even if I didn’t agree with it. Though, maybe in hindsight he was kind of right just in an adjacent way—how was I supposed to function now with half my heart ripped out of my chest and back in Louisiana?

“Sending him home was supposed to make things easier.”

He reached over and cupped my shoulder, squeezing it hard. “You love him, Wilder. You can’t tell me it’s not killing you that he’s gone.”