Page 49 of Paper Horses

Still the stare, but this time with a drawn-out head shake. I sat next to her, defeated with my attempts to understand a woman I’d once known every intimate detail of. Hell, I still knew those details—every birthmark, every freckle, every place that deepened her moans. I clutched the movies, only then noticing how close we were, our thighs touching. She turned her face up to me, her lips parting, and my eyes followed their movement. It would be so simple to drop the movies and sink my fingers into her hair, pull her face to mine and kiss her.

Simple yet dangerous. A move that would unravel years of blockades I had built around my heart and leave me defenseless to the inevitable. The moment she would leave me again. It had taken me years to lock my heart away, and I didn't know if I had the strength to do it again. Not if she was the one who unlocked it.

I turned from her, staring at the DVDs and breaking contact. A whoosh of air flooded my lungs, and I ran a hand over my face, trying to free myself of the inclination that had almost broken me.

“I don’t watch movies,” she said.

“Never?” I asked, not looking at her.

“No.”

Curt and final, with no explanation. We had gone to the movies many times over the four years we’d dated, yet she hadn’t since. Her life was so different now. She was so different. I looked over at her, observing her as she fidgeted with some unseen thing on her jeans. Maybe she’d only been different with me, and without me she’d become what I had shielded her from. The realization struck me like the lightning that streaked across the sky.

“You pick,” she said, her voice steadier with a demand to it like she was fighting her way back to the iciness to cover a weakness.

“Fine,” I snapped, my mood strangely dictated by hers. It was like a seesaw that teetered precariously between two extremes.

I chose an action movie, thinking it safe to stay away from anything with emotion or a romantic plot. Not that I had romances, but I wasn’t about to add even the remotest suggestion of one. When I returned to the couch, I took the other end, far from her. I should have chosen the recliner, but it was too close to where she was sitting, and I needed distance.

By the time the movie ended, the storm was battering at the house, and Olivia was sound asleep. I turned off the television, grabbed the blanket, and covered her. For as much as she’d been sleeping the last two days, I had to question if she ever slept at home…and what it was that kept her up at night. Against my better judgment, I moved a curl from her face and tucked it behind her ear. My heart twisted, more of its bindings crumbling as I took her in.

Sleep made her guard lower, her face peaceful, her breathing calm, and I wanted to keep her like this. Without whatever strain burdened her bones and kept her from smiling. From laughing. That instinct reared deep in my core to keep her here and not let her return to the city. Whatever was there, whatever she had left me for, had done this to her. Changed her so that my Olivia was merely a fragment of what she had once been. A glimmer below the façade.

Stuffing my hands in my pockets, I left her there, intent on checking on the horses. Certain the storm was spooking them. I didn’t really want to go out into the storm, but given the storm brewing in my chest, I needed to remove myself from the vicinity, knowing if I stayed, my walls would only crumble further.

Chapter 12

Liv

With a yawn, I stretched, a sense of emptiness waking me. I rubbed my eyes and sat up, pushing the blanket back. Checking my watch, I was shocked to find it was already seven. I must have fallen asleep again, which was strange because I barely slept at home.

I looked around for Hudson, but the house was empty. With a peek out of the front curtains, I saw the lights on in the barn, confirming my thought that he’d gone out to check on the horses. Being out there with him, working side by side, had cracked my foundation, leaving me confused.

Mucking stalls. That was not something an Icinda did, and I could just hear my father berating me for it. Perfection was what he strove for, and his children were a model of it. There had never been a time when he had let us be children. Only our mother had done that, letting us run in the sand and play with our toys outside of our rooms. Always when he was away, and if we left a single toy out, there were repercussions. Not to Mama. She was the only one he had never hurt. Not with words or hands, but he had hurt her even if he hadn’t realized it, by raising his hand to Gabe and aiming razor-sharp words at me. Words that had left their damage.

A boom of thunder broke the quiet, and I jumped. I’d always hated thunderstorms, crawling into bed with Gabe when we were little until our father found out and left a bruise so big on Gabe that Mama had cried for days. The words he had slung at me about what a baby I was, useless and weak, had left wounds that were not visible. I was a typical girl afraid of stupid things that a boy would never fear. I’d never let him see that fear again, staying in my bed when it stormed and throwing the blankets over my head, curled in a ball until the noise stopped.

When I met Hudson, he would fold me into his arms and hold me tight, counting between thunder strikes until the storm passed. He was the only one who ever knew thunderstorms still scared me.

I dropped the curtain, seeing that his boots and the raincoat that had hung on the rack were gone. He was out there, and a sudden desire to be close to him overtook me. I considered putting my new boots on, but didn’t want to ruin them—the rain was coming down heavy. I ran to the back of the house, where he had put Jessie’s boots in the laundry room, and tugged them on. Maybe being here was causing my sanity to tip because going into a rainstorm was not my idea of fun. Getting messy was not either, and yet here I was inviting it. I dug around in the drawer where the boots had been and found a yellow rain jacket with flowers on it.

Jessie. Damn, the woman had left her stuff everywhere like a claim on him. Married or not, the remnants of her bothered me. Knowing Hudson, he’d never thought about it and just stuffed the things away. Or maybe she and her husband came over. He’d said she used the boots when she went riding. I contemplated that idea, and how jealousy was the first emotion that had surfaced when, really, it may have been innocent. Not her attempt to keep another woman away from him or anything intentional. It was my mind that had made it something more. Envy that he had belonged to someone else when he had once been mine.

I pulled the jacket on, unsure of why I had a sudden need to hurry out of the house and into the storm. Preservation should have been at the forefront of my mind, but it wasn’t. I opened the door, yanking the hood up over my hair, and ran into the rain.

It was coming down in sheets, stinging my face like pellets of ice. I ducked my head down, questioning when I’d thrown caution to the wind. Rain soaked into my pants, and my boots sank in muddy puddles. Where the gravel driveway ended, water was streaming from the field like a river. From where I stood, it was only about three feet wide, but as it traveled south, it widened.

Hopping over it, I landed firmly on my feet, laughing at how I must have looked. Laughing? I didn’t laugh. Thunder roared, and I quickened my pace, forgetting the laughter. By the time I reached the barn, my jeans were soaked, and the wind had torn my hood back so my hair hung in thick wet strands that stuck to my face.

“Olivia, what the hell are you doing out here?” Hudson turned on me the moment he saw me step into the barn.

What was I doing there? A whim to be nearer to him? It wasn’t something I would admit, so I said, “I thought I should help.”

A complete lie and another rumble of thunder made me jump again. He shook his head and sighed.

“I appreciate the offer, even if it is very unlike you.” I pouted, throwing my hands on my hips, a look he ignored as he continued, “But I’m finished. Go back inside.”

He tossed his gloves in the bucket across from the horses before returning to the one he called Honey and gently rubbing her muzzle. I shook the water off me, feeling like a wet dog, and went over to the other horse. She hesitated before she let me pet her.