Page 29 of Paper Horses

Sheila returned to the counter, placing a thick belt and matching bracelet on the stack of clothes along with a handful of socks. I picked up the bracelet and studied it. Black leather with fake diamonds. I wanted to roll my eyes, but I kept the reaction to myself as she started ringing the items up.

I lowered it, my fingers draping over the necklace. The turquoise stone was so large and bold that it was as much a statement as Hudson choosing it for me. He snatched it from me and put it on the side of the pile.

“Ring this up separately. She can pay for the rest with her fancy credit card.”

I huffed, pulling my wallet out of my bag and bumping against the notebook I’d brought with me. Damn, I’d wanted to discuss the ranch over lunch. Ranch? Why did I care now if I called it a farm or a ranch? There was a reason I was here, and it wasn’t to dredge up old memories.

Hudson looked at the necklace tag and took forty dollars out of his wallet. He put it on the counter with the necklace and walked away. “Pack it up with her other stuff. See you at the festival, Sheila.”

“Festival?” I asked as he stormed from the store. “Does he always walk like a Clydesdale?”

“Not as heavy as he is today, but everyone knows Hudson’s the grumpy type. Would give the shirt off his back to help someone, but carries a load on his shoulders no one has ever lifted from him.” She peeked up at me as she scanned the tag, like she was waiting for my response. As if I had the cure for easing his load.

I hated to tell her I was the one who had caused it, but maybe she knew that already.

“And the festival?”

“Starts next Friday and runs through the weekend. Fingers crossed this storm doesn’t delay the company that sets it up from arriving on time. It’s the highlight of the fall. Candy apples, music and dancing, games, even a hayride. You should come.”

“Oh no. I won’t be here that long.” I would have been gone already if not for my meddling brother. “I’ll leave after the weekend.”

She shrugged. “Not if the storm hits like they say it will.”

Which was why she’d insisted I buy an extra pair of jeans and a few extra shirts. Hudson had my mind too frazzled to argue with her when she’d put them in the dressing room. It didn’t matter; I’d just donate it all when I got home.

She placed the clothes neatly in a brown-handled bag stamped with her store logo and then wrapped the necklace in a sheet of tissue paper before stuffing a few extra sheets over the top. Handing me the bag, she said, “I reckon you had your reasons for destroying that man the way you did. I don’t know the story, but I know he still carries it. No one has been able to break through the damage, and maybe it’s not my business.” No, it isn’t. “But we’re all family in this town, and he’s like a son to me. He needs happiness again, and if I had to guess, so do you. Find it in each other, and if you can’t, then part ways before you wreck him more than you have.”

I didn’t know why her words didn’t have my defenses up. Or why they left me scrambling for some explanation, something to ease her concern.

“I didn’t…” Maybe it was the time in the dressing room, or maybe it was the opening of wounds that left me raw and vulnerable, that left me like a newborn foal wobbling and unsteady. “I didn’t want to hurt him.” My voice cracked, the words barely a whisper. Tears fought the restraint I had placed on them so many years ago. This woman with her kind eyes reminded me of my mother. On the good days when love shone in her hazel eyes, her smile, so blinding, would lift me even on the worst of days. But those days had become sparse, a flickering of lightning in a storm of depression that had swallowed her.

The weight of Sheila’s hand brought me from my pain, and I exhaled for the first time in years, the truth of my life and all that I’d lost threatening to pour from me. Green irises studied me, and I wondered if she could see below the veil, the little girl who watched her little brother take the brunt of her father’s anger over and over until it left her so broken she had to sew a mask on to keep anyone from seeing her pain.

“Maybe not, but I don’t think you fared any better than he did. Find your peace, Olivia, and let him find his.”

I swallowed, pulling my hand free and replacing the emotion with the façade that protected me from it.

“I have peace,” I said, gathering the bag. “I have more money than I’ll ever need, a suite at the finest hotel in New York City, one I own, and people at my beck and call. I have all I need.”

I turned and rushed toward the door.

“But do you have what you really want?”

My step faltered, and I glanced back at her. “Everything.” The word was a mere whispered fragment of syllables because it was a lie.

She gave me a sad nod, and I looked away before my façade broke. Pushing through the door, I snapped at Hudson, who stood like a solid mass of muscle, waiting for me. His mouth was turned downward, his arms crossed, eyes dark.

“Let’s go. I’ve had enough of small-town life to last a century. How do you stand this?”

I walked past him, my steps solid and unfaltering, not caring for an answer. I wanted to get out of here. To run from it all. From him. From the possibility that flickered in the distance. From the disruption to my life. I wanted to go back to the previous morning and tell Gabe no. To never have seen Hudson again. To never have my heart so unprotected and my guardrails so rusty and bent.

Hudson was outside, letting the horses out to pasture, and I was gaping at the clothes on my bed, contemplating them as if they might reach up and smother me. He had barked at me to get changed, and I fully intended to ignore his command. I rolled the leather cord of the necklace between my fingers, its weight like I held a collapsing bridge in my palm.

I gently placed it on the dresser, smoothing my finger over the stone. Grabbing my laptop from where I had it charging, I headed downstairs, my heels clumping on the wooden stairs. I sat at the island, booting up and biting my lip as I realized I didn’t have his Wi-Fi password.

With an annoyed huff, I slid off the stool and surveyed the kitchen, seeing no notes anywhere. I wandered into the living room, where the fireplace sat quiet with no fire to fill it. Leather couches, masculine and large, took up the bulk of the room with a worn recliner in the corner. A pile of books sat on the table next to it, and I picked one up to find it was a history of horse husbandry. A smile rose on my lips as I looked at the other titles, all horse books. Hudson had always been obsessed with horses, which is why it surprised me that he’d bought a cattle ranch. Horses were his passion.

I continued my search, walking into the office tucked at the back of the house. After hitting the lights, I looked around, seeing signs of a man whose very presence unlocked a part of me that fought to be free again. I draped my hands over the bookshelves, seeing his diploma framed and hung in the corner, a few trophies from when he played lacrosse sitting on a wooden filing cabinet. I remembered going to his games and sitting in the stands, cheering him on as he loped across the field with grace and confidence. A few medals from riding when he was young, before I’d met him, hung on a hook near the door. But it was what I found on his desk, something so familiar and achingly painful, that caused my chest to lurch and a cry to escape. I bit it back, covering my mouth with my hand and shoving my emotion into its prison.