Page 25 of Wild Sanctuary

I’m definitely going to make him smile before I leave. Even if it kills me.

The conversation flows around us, easy and warm. Colt launches into a story about the time Wyatt tried to fix the barn roof by himself and ended up stuck up there for six hours.

“In his defense”—Colt grins broadly—“the ladder did break.”

“The ladder broke because you borrowed it the week before and didn’t tell anyone it was cracked,” Wyatt mutters.

“Allegedly.”

“I have the hospital bill.”

“So there’s our fearless leader,” Colt continues, ignoring him, “stranded on the roof in the middle of July, no phone, no water, pride too big to yell for help⁠—”

“I yelled.”

“He yelled once,” West confirms. “Quietly.”

“And where were the rest of you?” I ask.

“Town.” June tries to hide her smile. “All of us. For hours.”

“It was the Fourth of July parade,” Maggie adds. “Which Wyatt refused to attend because, and I quote, ‘someone has to keep this place runnin’.’”

“So he’s up there roasting like a rotisserie chicken,” Colt continues, “and who finally finds him? Old Dave. Who is—wait, how old is Dave now?”

“Seventy-six,” West supplies.

“Seventy-six years old, deaf in one ear, and he spots Wyatt on the roof before any of us even got home.” Colt shakes his head in mock despair. “Dave had to drive the tractor over and let Wyatt climb down into the hay cart. Like a cat stuck in a tree.”

“A very sunburned cat,” Maggie adds.

“I wasn’t sunburned.”

“You peeled for two weeks.”

“It was one week.”

“I made you wear aloe like a second skin, Wy.” June smirks. “And I have photos.”

“You do not.”

“I absolutely do. You looked like a lobster wearing a cowboy hat.”

I catch the faintest crack in Wyatt’s composure—his mouth twitching at one corner before he forces it back into a flat line.

Oh.

Oh no.

Red alert!

That twitch. That reluctant, barely-there, fighting-it-with-everything-he-has almost-smile is the most devastating thing I’ve ever seen on a man’s face. My lungs forget their one job. Because when Wyatt Hartley almost smiles, his whole face changes—the hard line of his mouth softens, and the tension around his eyes releases for just a fraction of a second, and he looks like someone you could reach. Someone you could touch without your hand hitting a wall.

I look away before he catches me staring. Grab my water glass and take a sip I don’t need.

If I watch him almost-smile one more time, I’m going to do something catastrophically stupid. Like climb this man in front of his entire family on a Sunday.

Stop. It. Stop it right now, Monroe.