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She went very still, and he saw that she knew as well as anyone that that was not a good sign. And when she repeated her question, her tone was grim. “What happened to him?”
He couldn’t stop the slight smile that went with his one-shouldered shrug. “I bought him.”
Chapter Eighteen
Of all thethings she might have expected, that wasn’t one of them. Nic hoped she wasn’t gaping at him, but she wasn’t sure she wasn’t.
“You bought him?”
He nodded. Then, with a wry smile, he said, “They thought I was crazy. It was the first season, we didn’t even know if there’d be another at that point, and it wasn’t like I was rolling in money at that stage.”
So he’d spent money he at that time couldn’t spare, to save a horse he’d apparently bonded with. And now that he was likely raking it in, he’d walked away for the sake of his son. Yes, she had most definitely misjudged the man.
“What did you do with him?” she asked, genuinely curious.
“He’s boarded at a rescue place at the moment. Someone my friend Tucker knows runs it. I pay them, and that helps them keep the rescue going.”
Somehow she knew he was paying more than what a standard boarding fee would be. And that she was certain of this told her just how much her opinion of the man had shifted.
As they headed out, she had to admit he could ride. She could always tell when a rider was new or nervous. They were very aware of what they were doing. There was a certain tenseness in the way they sat, the way they moved. Jackson showed none of that. He was relaxed, with an easy posture and perfect minimal tension on the reins. Beyond the occasional pat of approval he gave Shade, which she herself often did when riding a new-to-her horse, she would have thought he and the gray were old friends.
Maybe it was that that made her decide to head out to her favorite spot on the ranch. She didn’t take everyone there. Her mother joked that she hoarded it for herself, and perhaps she did. When they’d been in negotiations to sell off that big chunk of land, once she’d resigned herself to the necessity, her only demand had been that this spot stay theirs. And her father had stuck to his guns on that point, declaring it nonnegotiable from the get-go.
As they rode, she noticed he had the look of someone soaking things in. He didn’t just look around, he studied. And, she guessed, absorbed. She had the odd thought that perhaps he was analyzing how the terrain they were portraying onStonewallwas so very different from the terrain they were crossing now. Which made her glad she’d decided to bring him here.
They headed up the slow rise, and she found herself mentally timing their progress, because she wanted to be sure she was watching him when they reached the top. She wasn’t sure why it was important to her, but it was.
They crested the slope, and he immediately—and gently—reined in Shade. He stared out over the vista before them, the long, rolling undulation of the hills, with the glint of the Pedernales River in the distance. She saw his lips part and his chest rise as he took in a deep breath, as if the air were scented with some sweet scent he couldn’t name.
“Whoa,” he whispered, so low she wouldn’t have caught it if she hadn’t been looking at him.
He stared out at the hills, as if he’d never seen anything like this before. And Nic realized that, if this had been a test, he’d passed with flying colors. And perhaps it had been a test, a very personal one for her, because how someone reacted to this, her favorite place, meant a lot to her.
And told her a lot.
“In spring that’s covered with bluebonnets as far as you can see,” she said quietly. “And if you time it just right, at sunrise, they’re the same color as the sky, and it’s like you’re in some endless tunnel of blue. There’s a video on the Bluebonnet Festival website one of our local guys did with a drone at the exact right moment, and it’s amazing.”
He looked at her then. “You love this place. And I don’t mean just this particular spot. You love this land.”
“I do.”
“I always had a... different sort of feeling when I came to Texas, that there’s a... spirit about the place.”
She liked the way he’d put that. “There is. And if it speaks to you, you’ll never want to leave.”
He looked back out over the hills. “I’ve never felt that way about a place.”
“I’d say any spirit that was once there has been pretty well stomped out of California.”
His gaze shot back to her face, and he gave her a wry smile. “I could not and would not argue that. Except to add that if you let it, it’ll suck your own spirit right out of you.”
She had never expected him to be so... aware. Somehow she’d always thought of people in his business as feeding on the kind of energy the place held, a kind of energy that might be powerful, but was fueled by actions and decisions she didn’t much care for.
“Do you think maybe that’s part of what happened with Jeremy?”
He nodded. “That’s one reason I wanted him out of there. So after he said he wished the ranch on the show was real...”
Was that what had started this? A simple wish for the impossible, that had made this man come as close as he couldto making that wish a reality? And never mind what it cost him personally?
