Page 53 of Maverick
He’s really not mean.
He’s guarded. Hard. He doesn’t want to be immediately available to anybody, and I understand that. He’s his own whole thing.
But mean isn’t it.
“I bet you love him.”
“Oh, come on.”
“You do. You love this horse.”
“This horse is a pain in my butt. A millstone around my neck. Another obligation I have to fulfill.” And I can tell that what he really means is that he loves the horse.
We make our way down the stable aisle, and go to where Frank is. I stop along the way and greet Cloud Dancing. I love the smell. Hay and dirt. Horses. The smell of shavings, even if they aren’t strictly clean. This is in my blood.
He is right about one thing: nothing about it has ever been a waste of time. Nothing about this deep, intense love that I have for these animals has ever been a waste.
He goes into the tack room and appears with a blanket, saddle, and bridle. He sets the saddle across the sawhorse and then gets Frank out of the stall.
“Nice to have a groom to handle all this for me again,” I say as I watch him get Frank prepared.
He looks up at me, and those eyes hit me like lightning. Honestly, this is so hot. Watching a man do this is just… Glorious. I can’t help it. I’m a horse girl unto my soul. Yes, my parents got me into it, yes, at this point in my life, that’s complicated. But it’s part of who I am, and makes up my DNA in much the same way my blonde hair and blue eyes do. Things that have been handed down to me, that I didn’t get a say in, but that are real nonetheless.
And apparently, I really like a man who knows his way around the horse, too. For one brief moment, it’s easy for me to imagine myself with him here. Forever. Living on his ranch, kissing him on his couch, letting him thrust inside me in the shower.
I’ve never really thought that far ahead. To love, marriage, children, but he has. He wanted those things at one time. But I can see it. Here. With him. That’s terrifying.
Virginal bullshit, honestly. The kind of thing that young women who have sex for the first time often end up fantasizing about, or so I’m given to believe.
And that’s all I’m doing here. I’m making this into something bigger than it is. Making him into something bigger than he is.
It’s a fool’s errand, honestly.
I know better.
But for a brief moment, it was a rush of dopamine. To imagine that life, to imagine him that way.
I choose to push it aside, though. I think I’m a little bit more realistic than some. I think.
I watch as he grips Frank’s reins and leads him out of the barn. The picture that he makes with the horse is something. Makes my heart beat faster.
Yeah. I didn’t really expect for this part of it to be an aphrodisiac. But it sure as hell is.
“We’re going to use this arena,” he says, gesturing to a large covered space to the left of the barn. I’m impressed with the facility. My parents’ is one of the best in the area, and in Sonoma, that’s really saying something. They do clinics there on all kinds of things to justify the expense of how elaborate it is, but for a facility where I assume none of that is going on, his is spectacular.
“How many boarders do you have?” I ask.
“About fifteen. Not only does it provide a little bit of income, they all pitch in and do a bit of work. Rotate out mucking stalls and things like that. With me being gone so much, that’s extremely helpful.”
“A great way to get a semi-working ranch going when you can’t afford to be a full-time rancher.”
“Part-time rancher. Full-time cowboy,” he says, looking at me. And damned if that doesn’t make my heart turn over on itself.
“Well. It’s smart anyway.”
“I said I wasn’t nice, I didn’t say I wasn’t smart.”
I can’t tell if he’s flirting with me or what. I assume that for him, this is flirting. It makes me feel breathless. Makes me feel fluttery. But then, that’s him. He makes me feel just a little bit too much, all the time.
