Page 16 of Live for Me

I nodded once. “I’ve been looking for this photo forever. When I couldn’t find it, I just assumed it was lost.”

Denver looked up to the house and then down to the bunkhouse. Then, it hit him. “The flood, Beau.”

Fuck. How could I have forgotten?

A few years ago, it rained for thirteen days straight, the water over flowing the river north of the town and the creeks around it. It backed up to the ranch, flooding the main pasture, the barn, and the bunkhouse. We’d moved all our personal belongings into the main house for safe keeping until it passed.

I closed my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose. “That must be it,” I mumbled. When I opened my eyes again, I found Denver studying me again, and I felt a wave of guilt slam into me. “I apologize, Den. I was just—”

“Don’t apologize. I’d go a damn rampage if I found a picture of my woman in the bunkhouse,” he said, cutting me off sharply.

My woman.

Those words were like a punch to the gut, and I wanted to double over from the pain burning inside me. I hadn’t spoken her name in over three years and I’d just fucking relapsed, the need to see her, to touch her, to hear her voice pulsing through my veins.

“She’s not my woman, Den. Not anymore,” I sighed, looking out to the pasture, watching the grass sway back and forth in the even wind. The need would go away—eventually. It always did.

“Do you want me to get rid of it?”

The question slammed into me like a fucking train. My head snapped back to him. “What the hell did you just say?”

He tipped his hat to the photo and, instinctively, my fingers tightened around it. Like hell I’d let him take this away from me. A low growl came from me as I bit off, “No.”

The corner of his mouth tipped up and he nodded once. “Alright, Beau.”

I blinked, the sudden feeling of possessiveness fading away as I looked out into the field again, lowering my hand to my side,my thumb stroking over the photo. Denver’s hand landed on my shoulder then, squeezing. “You alright?”

My throat worked, Abbie’s sweet, musical laughter echoing in my ears as I remembered the night I’d chased her through this field and around the pair of a trees in the distance. It had been chilly that night, the first of October. She had been studying for her mid-terms and needed a break from the books. When I caught her at the edge of the pasture, I’d spun her around in my arms and captured her mouth, kissing her until we were both breathless.

“Beau.”

Denver’s voice shattered the memory, reminding me of how far in the future I was. The bleak and lonely feature. I bent my head, shoved the photo into my back pocket, and cleared my throat. “Yeah. I’m okay,” I answered, knowing damn well neither one of us believed that.

“Try to get some rest tonight, yeah?” He clapped me on the shoulder, and a second later, I heard the gravel crunching under his boots. He was heading into this home, on his ranch, to kiss his beautiful wife, son, and daughter. Time passed, and as my good friend cherished his happily ever after, I remained where I was, staring out into the evening as the sun set lower and lower with each passing second. I didn’t move until the moon was high, the stars twinkling in the sky as I sat trapped in the past.

The past wasn’t filled with pain.

It was filled with the only love I’d ever known and a warmth I would never forget, no matter how much I wanted to.

I was chained to it, to the life I’d thought I would have with her.

Now, I was nothing more than a lonely cowboy, the world passing him by without a single care.

I was in my own version of hell. No amount of time could fix that.

As I walked down the hill to the bunkhouse, the memory of her faded behind me. I would never be able to move on.

Abbie Spears was branded into my soul.

Fourteen years ago. Hayden, CO.

Age: Seventeen.

I looked over to Mason as he stared down into the corral, watching the bull buck and thrash. The beast was doing everything it could to get his rider off him. The crowd around us cheered as the clock counted the seconds. The beast huffed through its nose before bucking again, flying in the air and kicking its back legs before spinning.

The rider, a local bull rider Mason had become obsessed with, was thrown off, landing hard in the dirt. The crowd gasped, watching in horror as the cowboy scrambled to get back as the bull charged him. The bull wranglers cut the beast off just in time, and the rider shot to his feet, jogging away as he held his hat in the air. The crowd of Hayden and the town over roared, the people shooting to their feet, whistling and clapping for the young man.

It was impressive, yeah.

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