Page 58 of Slow Burn

Still, I can’t say with any amount of certainty I wouldn’t do the same thing again. It doesn’t change the fact that what they were doing was wrong, and I wasn’t willing to put my name on any of those files.

But the video shows me how it looked to anyone watching, including any prospective employers. My actions paint me as someone who is emotionally unstable, a loose cannon. Not someone who can be trusted, or reliable.

I slam my laptop shut and put it down on the coffee table.

The storm has really picked up now, wind buffeting the side of the little rancher, the shutters rattling outside the living room window. Lightning flashes and thunder claps loudly overhead. Maybe it’s the storm, or maybe it’s because I’ve been sitting here moping and chastising myself, but I don’t want to be alone anymore.

I also have no desire to be around people. People are too… people-y.

So, I get up from the couch, throw on my rain jacket and boots, and head out into the blustery night toward the barn.

Chapter 23

Beck

The wind is howling now, the occasional boom of thunder and flash of lightning making me jumpy. I would be happier about the rain, that the fields are getting the water they so desperately need, but this kind of rain comes at a price.

When the soil is parched to the point of being cracked, water runoff is worse. Nothing gets absorbed.

Already, other farms have been battling flood waters in low lying places. Farms that are closer to the river have had to move cattle to higher ground, sometimes herding in the middle of the night. So far, Wild Sage has remained unscathed, but if this goes on for much longer, or gets any worse, we’ll be in trouble, too.

Lyla mentioned something about ranches succumbing to environmental changes when she showed me her notes. You either work with it, or it works against you, she said. She’s not wrong, but what she doesn’t realize is how deep a rancher’s respect for the environment goes. One bad spring can make or break your living, one dry winter can affect you the rest of the year. It’s getting worse, I know it is.

Lyla is smart. Brilliant.

That’s why I know she’ll have come to the same conclusion I did the other day that whatever is happening between us can’t go any further. She’ll know that if I cross any more lines with her, irreparable damage will be done between me and Austin.

But knowing it didn’t make it any easier to walk away. Seeing her face drop when I pulled back and out of her arms was soul crushing. My chest still aches where she had rested her hand above my heart.

I turn over in bed, unable to sleep. My room lights up with another lightning strike, and the thunder clap that follows is close on its heels. It shakes the house, and my mind immediately goes to Willow.

She’s a stubborn mare and sure knows her own mind, but she hates storms. Loud noises in general spook her easily. With no sign of the thunder and lightning passing any time soon, I decide to go down to the barn to check on her.

I get out of bed and throw on my jeans, a t-shirt, and a zip-up hoody, and tread lightly through the house so as not to wake Dad. I slip on my boots and grab a jacket before stepping out into the storm.

It’s fucking miserable, the rain coming down sideways now, wind gusting. I pull my hood up and hold it in place, boots slopping and squelching in the muddy earth as I run to the barn.

When I get closer, I notice the door is open, and I wonder if I forgot to shut it properly or if the wind blew it open. But then I see the warm light glowing from inside and realize someone else has already beat me down here.

I round the corner, expecting to see Austin, or Nash, or anyone else besides Lyla Morgan.

She’s sitting on the ground, back against Willow’s stall door, legs outstretched with one ankle crossed over the other. Willow and Bandit both have their heads hanging over the stall door, and where I anticipated finding wild eyed, frantic horses, they’re calm, eyelids drooping as if they’re moments away from sleep.

On the floor next to her is her laptop, which is the source of the music I can hear now that I’m out of the pounding rain, and Kenny Rogers, laying comfortably beside her. She’s murmuring something to him, but I can’t make out what she’s saying as she scratches him between those strange eyes.

As I get closer, the song becomes clearer, the melody familiar. Islands in the Stream. I huff a laugh and shake my head because of course Lyla would be out here playing Kenny Rogers the music of his namesake. My chest tightens as I regard her, the kind, tender compassion for my animals practically oozing from her.

Lyla is unlike anyone I have ever known. She radiates beauty from the inside out, like her heart of gold shimmers and shines through each of her pores. Still, there’s a flicker of annoyance at the way she ran off without giving me a chance to explain myself to her on the balcony the other day. I wanted to. It was perhaps the first time I ever felt like I wanted to explain to someone why I did what I did, to let someone into my inner world. Explain to her that I’m in love with her, and how painful it is that we can’t be together the way we want.

I let myself cool off for a few days, and poured myself into work. Tate needed some help when his cows had to be herded to higher ground. It was good for me, and my anger has settled now. I’m more level-headed. At least, I was until this moment.

Seeing her again, it all comes rushing back. The way I love her, the way I yearn for her. The frustration that there will never be a world where we can be together. The anger I have towards myself that I gave in, and put her in a position to get hurt. Either way, it feels like I lose, somehow.

She must sense my presence, and her gaze snaps over to me. Her eyes widen, her plush lips popping open in surprise as if she wasn’t expecting to see me.

“Beck…” she starts. “I was…”

She moves to stand but I put up a hand to stop her.