Page 52 of Tame Our Wild

Why didn’t I catch the earlier flight that would’ve gotten in this morning instead?

It’s a fight the entire time to guide him to the couch. The second we reach it, he crashes down with the force of freshly cut timber, plummeting to the forest floor. The single lit lamp reflects off the beads of sweat slipping down his temple. He’s sweating profusely now that his body is inside.

Hustling, I fill a glass of water, grab a trash can from the bathroom, a bottle of Advil, and run a washcloth under a warm stream of water. When I get back, his hands are folded on his stomach, his eyes closed as he faces the ceiling. I move to sit on the edge of the couch, draping the warm cloth over his forehead.

He jolts in surprise, his fluttering, glassy eyes barely holding mine. I dab at his forehead with the washcloth. “I expected to come back to a random girl in your bed,” I tease. “Not you drunk off your ass.”

I mean, plenty of people get drunk on New Year’s Eve. But not like this.

He stifles a pained chuckle. “You just missed them.”

“Did I?” My voice is laced with mischief to mask how terrified I am seeing him this way. “Shouldn’t say I’m surprised. You have a talent for picking up women after every event.”

He shifts lazily, his tone smooth. “Have I done that this year?”

I reach into my folder of memories, trying to locate a time this year when I saw him leave the arena with a random girl. There’s got to be at least one. He was known for being the playboy bull rider and lived up to that title my first year in the PBR. There is usually an event on Saturday and Sunday, and both nights he would leave with someone new, which is another reason I thought he was an asshole. He would run through buckle bunnies like they were just something warm to sink into. I just assumed nothing would’ve changed.

My hand, clutching the washcloth, pauses. “I guess not.”

When I start to lift it off, Colson’s hand snaps upward, his calloused fingers softly wrapping around my wrist to keep me in place. He lets go, letting his thumb gently drift over the backs of my knuckles. “That feels nice,” he mutters.

The wet cloth or touching me? I want to ask, but I hold my tongue.

I don’t stop his movements as he draws circles on the back of my hand. My eyes are drawn to the leather bracelet on his wrist, but it’s the flower charm that catches my eye as the soft light from the lamp flickers off the metal. As I look more closely, I notice the charm is attached to a chain braided through the worn leather.

I swallow, tearing my eyes from it, the hard clutches of curiosity digging its claws into my chest. My tone is a whisper. “Why are you drunk, Colson? And why were you outside at this time of night?”

He sighs. “Time goes faster when you can’t remember why you’re lonely, especially this time of year. Demons never rest, dust bunny.”

Something in my chest bursts for him. My heart leaps against my ribs, trying to impale itself with the fragments.

He feels that way? When he said he was spending the holidays here, I assumed it was because he had to keep up with the ranch—not because he had nobody to spend it with.

Why won’t he go spend it with his parents and Paisley?

All these thoughts are running rampant through my mind as I take in the broken man before me with new eyes. Not because his brokenness defines him, but because he’s way more complex than I thought. I thought I knew him as the cocky veteran bull rider with an ego to match, but beneath all that, I’m not sure I know him at all.

Who is Colson Payne outside of bull riding?

Who is he outside of our rivalry?

I caress his temple, wiping away a bead of sweat. “I hate seeing you like this. I would’ve stayed if I’d known.” I would have. I love spending the holidays at home, but nobody should ever feel the way he does, even though I sometimes find his presence annoying.

Wow. That’s a change, since it used to be all the time.

Each rotation of his thumb, caressing my hand, winds something unnamed inside me. It seems to calm him, and I won’t lie, it does the same to me.

The muscles in his throat move as he swallows. “Would it make you feel better if I say that I feel a lot less lonely with you around?”

“No,” I breathe. “Because now it has me wondering how wasted you were last year.”

He’s thinking awfully hard about it. “Can’t remember.”

His name off my tongue cuts through the air. “Colson—”

His hand moves, slipping around my hip to drape across the small of my back. He tugs, pulling my body perched on the edge of the couch closer to be tucked into his side as he stays sprawled out. I brave a look down, observing as his other hand drifts over my thigh. I’m wearing leggings, but his touch elicits sparklers that dance across my skin as if I’m wearing nothing. His fingers glide high, so fucking high up my leg as he reaches that bikini line that has my breath solidifying in my lungs.

He’s not aware of what he’s doing.