Page 9 of In the Dust

The ride back to the stables is much calmer. Dad and his horse are gently galloping beside me and Pixie.

“So, we’ve got the cattle wrangled and the hay stacked,” I tell him.

“He stacked the hay?”

I nod. “Yeah, we put it on the empty shelf.”

Dad takes one look at me, wondering if I’m really that clueless. “So, you took the hay from one wall and put it on another?”

Come to think of it, that was a little odd. I shrug. “Yup.”

Before riding off, he tips his hat to me. “I don’t think Colton was re-decorating the stables, Dixie. I think he was wanting to impress you.”

“Pshh,” I croak. “He’ll have to do a lot more than that.”

When we get back, Dad puts up Texas and heads inside. I walk up to Colton, who now is sitting on the bales, drinking a glass of water. I sit beside him, and he hands it to me. I take a sip without thinking about how his lips were just on the rim and that this could be inappropriate to my boyfriend to do that.

How it’s even more inappropriate that I’m watching the way his muscles bend and flex as he stretches. “Wanna go on a ride?” he asks.

Now that is most definitely, positively, crossing the line. “I just rode. I’m okay.”

He laughs, standing up. “Come on. There are new things I need to show you. It will be easier if we’re together.”

Hesitantly, I stand up. “You sure we need to?”

“Positive.”

He helps me up in front of him on Pixie and instinctively, I sink into him, unable to hold back the way we fit together, like a glove. A glove laced with fire and gasoline.

So many things to say, too much unforgiving time to say them. We’re quiet at first, letting Pixie guide us around the land.

There are new crops sections, and over the big hill a wildflower patch has sprung. “It’s so beautiful here,” I whisper.

He stops Pixie in the middle of the flowers while his strong hand rests on my hip, and the feeling of his touch brings me back to when we were young. “You always love—”

I cut him off, unable to hear one more thing about the past. It’s in the past, and it can’t come back. “I can’t walk down memory lane with you, Colton.”

“Wasn’t trying to, Dixie,” he sneers, hopping off Pixie … I mean Peaches, and stomps away from me.

I don’t feel like dealing with this right now, but as he’s getting farther away from me, it makes my heart sink. “I’ll leave you here, Colton Payne!”

He doesn’t turn; he just lifts his hand in the air. “Go ahead and leave me, Dixie. It’s what you’re fucking good at.”

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