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Luke was quiet for what felt like a very long time but was really only a few extra seconds. Sawyer let the silence stretch out this time, giving his brother space to think. Slowly, Luke nodded, his expression still stern and thoughtful.
“Don’t do this if it’s out of guilt,” he said, looking Sawyer square in the eye. “Don’t do it if it’s not what you actually want, because then what’s the point? Do it only if you want it, Sawyer.”
“I want it,” he said without hesitation. And for the first time in a very long time, he was completely sure of something.
CHAPTER 18
JOSIE
There wasn’t enough work on the ranch to keep Josie busy. Not as busy as she needed to be to block out every stray thought that wandered into her head unhelpfully. All of the major repairs, the ones she’d been chipping away at for months and months, were done thanks to Sawyer’s help and she couldn’t use the hard work as an excuse to keep her mind clear anymore. Mostly she’d taken to just spending as much time with the horses as possible before the place sold, the threat of the eventual sale hanging over her neck like a guillotine, ready to drop at any moment without warning.
But even grooming the horses till their coats shone in the dim afternoon light of the barn wasn’t much of a distraction.
She kept thinking about Sawyer, which she very much didn’t want to do. But she alsodidwant to. But she didn’t. Then the confusion got her so wound up that she’d throw herself into some new task and try to distract herself all over again. He hadn’t been in touch since he left, but to be fair she hadn’t reached out either, and a text would be easy to send. A simple hello, asking him what had happened. Mostly she wanted to askif he was all right because Luke had given her a full rundown of the brothers’ argument, Luke looking shamefaced through the whole explanation. Josie had called him an idiot, and he’d agreed because Sawyer wasn’t the only one at fault.
Josie had seen a softer side to the football player over the weeks he’d been helping at the ranch. A side that she was sure not a lot of people knew about and she wascertainthat Luke had no idea existed below the surface. The only way Sawyer had known to try and fix things was to remove himself, to leave so that he didn’t cause any more trouble. Was it the most mature, well-thought-out response? No. Both Butler brothers had made mistakes. But Josie still didn’t like the thought of Sawyer back in the city, alone, even though he’d be surrounded by more people than ever.
Her brain had been in the same cycle of the same thoughts for days, and she was exhausted from it. Maybe she could paint the barn again, give it a second coat? Or go and check all the fences one by one to make sure they hadn’t missed anything. But she knew they hadn’t. She and Sawyer, unfortunately, had done too good a job the first time around.
She leaned her forehead against Indy’s neck, the mare patient as ever with Josie’s dramatics. Maybe she should ask for extra shifts at the diner? The dinner rush had been busier than ever lately.
“Josie?”
She spun and found Sawyer just a few yards away, standing in the barn like he’d never left.
She wasn’t normally spooked all that easily, but it had been an emotional week and she was down to her last thread of sanity.Seeing Sawyer there, she yelped and dropped her brushes with a clatter, making the horses prick their ears and stamp their feet, Indy narrowly missing clomping down on Josie’s toes with her hoof. Josie slapped a hand over her mouth while Sawyer stood there with his hands in the air like he was trying to calm a hostage or something.
“You scared me half to death!” she yelled, throwing a currycomb at him that was so poorly aimed that Sawyer watched it fly right past him without even bothering to flinch out of its trajectory.
“I was aiming for your head, just so you know!”
“I’m sorry.”
Josie swallowed. She might have been thinking obsessively about some sort of reunion, but she wasn’t actually prepared for one.
“Yeah, well,” she stammered, “apologize to the horses as well ’cause now they’re all spooked wondering why you’re back here when apparently it was all too hard.”
What had happened to seeing his point of view, to understanding why he’d left when Luke had raked him over the coals like he had? Her neck burned and she started gathering up her grooming gear entirely on autopilot. Sawyer took a step forward to help.
“Don’t,” she snapped, and he pulled back his hands like he’d been bit. “Don’t bother,” she said, quieter this time. Quiet enough that even she could hear the hurt in her voice, the hurt she’d denied was there because it was too painful to look at.
“I’m sorry,” he said again, even though Josie point-blank refused to look at him.
“I can clean up myself. I’m a big girl.”
“Josie,” Sawyer said, so insistent that despite herself she looked up at him. “I’m sorry for what I did. For leaving. I’m sorry.”
His face was as somber as a grave, and Josie nearly broke right then and there. It would have been so easy to drop the brushes in her hands, to fall into him, to be swept up and taken care of. But she made herself take a step backwards.
“Okay,” she said, not sure how else to respond that wouldn’t have broken her.
“It’s going to take more than one apology, I know,” he said, looking like he was in pain, just as much as she was. But it would be too good to be true, to think that he was really back, intending to fix things.
“If you really wanted to apologize, you’d be on your knees,” she said, bending down and scooping up the last of her brushes. When she looked up she nearly dropped them again. In one lithe movement, without a moment’s hesitation, Sawyer had gotten to his knees on the dirty barn floor, still watching her with a sad but determined expression.
“I didn’t mean, like, literally,” Josie said, frozen in place.
“Anything you ask, it’s yours,” he said, making no move to get up. “And like I said, there’s gonna need to be more than just one apology, so the only way I can show that I’m serious is to do as you ask.”
