Page 24 of Wilder

I winced. “Yeah.”

He let out another hum, his gaze flicking toward the barn doors like he was already doing the math in his head—figuring out how much ground would need to be covered in my absence, how the workload would shift, who’d have to step up. “Guess that would be a conversation you and Wilder have.”

I exhaled slowly, adjusting my grip on the bucket. “I’ll head up to the house, see if he’s got time to talk to me.”

Sully let out a low chuckle, shaking his head like I’d just said something hilarious. “Torres, that man always has time for you.”

My stomach flipped. Heat bloomed across my face instantly, my pulse suddenly too loud in my ears.

What the hell did that mean?

I stared at him for half a second too long, scrambling for a response, for anything that didn’t make me sound like a complete idiot, but Sully just smirked, uncrossing his arms and reaching over to snag the bucket from me.

“Better get going before he gets pulled into a project.” He gave a sharp nod to the barn doors.

I swallowed, my mouth snapping shut, still not entirely sure how to respond to any of that.

Instead of trying to figure it out, though, and risk embarrassing myself any further, I darted around Sully and made my way to the doors.

Hopefully, by the time I got up to the main house my face wouldn’t look so beet red.

And if it was?

Maybe I could blame it on the wind chill.

Yeah.

That sounded totally reasonable and not suspicious at all.

CHAPTER 7

Wilder

“Thank you, dear.” My mama’s warm hand grazed over mine as she took a hold of the saucer and cup I handed her way, the two pieces clinking together slightly as she brought it up to her lips.

I stood by just long enough to make sure the tea made it up to her mouth without the whole thing toppling over and spilling the once boiling liquid into her lap. One too many times, we had some close calls since winter hit; the shakiness in her hands growing worse this past year especially.

I hated to see age catch up to my mama. My memories of her were locked in a time long since passed, back when my father was still alive and I was just barely up to his shoulder. She’d been spritely back then, a real firecracker of a woman who carried a sharp-witted tongue that never quite seemed to know how to stop moving.

But now?

Now, the weight of the years was pressing down on her, catching up in ways that were hard to ignore no matter how much I wanted to. The lines on her face were deeper, carved into her skin like the stories she carried. Her hands, once so steady and sure, now trembled when she reached for things, the strength in them dwindling little by little as the years rolled by.

It made my chest ache.

“Of course, Mama,” I said, my voice softer than I intended.

Her gray-blue eyes, still sharp despite the years, flicked away from the TV to glance up at me. “Oh, quit your fussin’. I’m not made of glass, Wilder Reese.”

I huffed out a laugh, forcing back the sudden lump in my throat.

The use of my middle name, the last living piece of my father the both of us had left, was always a sure-fire way to get me to listen to her. That was for sure.

She only pulled it out when she was tired of me hovering, when she wanted to remind me in the only way she knew how that despite the years, she was still as strong and still as capable as she was way back then.

“Sorry, Mama.”

She waved her hand at me, after carefully settling her cup and saucer down on the arm of the couch, her movements slow but deliberate. “Go on, now. I know you haven’t eaten yet. I can hear that stomach of yours growlin’ from all the way over here.”