Page 45 of A Photo Finish
I shake my head.
I almost combusted on the spot. I almost turned into the soldier that I haven’t been in six years now.
Which is exactly why Violet is a weakness I can’t afford. I’ve worked too hard to combat my outbursts and my down days, the ones where I can’t even muster the energy to smile. Against all my best instincts, even when I know I’m nothing but a hot mess where she’s concerned, I wanted to be there for her. To chase her down and fix things for her. Which is a terrible idea. Colossally stupid.
And exactly what she doesn’t want.
I want to call Trixie, but it’s too late to be doing that. I hang my head in my hands and mutter to myself, “Good work, Harding.”
The horse nickers from across the driveway and bobs her head at me with a long blink of her thick lashes. I can’t help but chuckle. She is relentless. No quit in that one. I leave the tumbler on the deck and walk across to the fence where the horse is waiting.
She’s kind of hard not to like. Her ears prick forward at my approach, and her head rises just a little taller in excitement. I swear if she had the right kind of tail, she’d be wagging it.
“Hey, girl,” I whisper, running my hand down her neck and feeling the heat of her exhale against my stomach as she nuzzles in.
She’s the first horse I’ve touched since my dad died. I’ve barely allowed myself to admit this, but it feels good. Therapeutic maybe. The soft prickle of her coat under my fingers . . . I wonder if I’m having the same tactile experience that my dad might have had when he was still alive. If I’m feeling the same thing as he did once.
Her excited whinny every time I pull up to the house almost makes me smile, and the way she followed me around quietly while I worked out here earlier made me feel . . . I don’t know. Worthy of attention.
Like maybe I could be likable after all.
I walk down to the corner of her paddock where there is a stack of square hay bales under a blue tarp, and she follows. Lifting a corner of the tarp, I pull a flake off the top bale and inhale the dusty, grassy smell as I carry it back over to her feeder.
The hay is all over my suit, but I don’t care. Material shit hasn’t mattered to me in years. I guess that’s why I live in a small and dated condo in a four-story walk up in Vancouver’s West End neighborhood. It’s a clean place to lay my head at night while I go through the motions of my day-to-day schedule. My days of feeding into my mother’s elite lifestyle died along with my engagement to Hilary.
I’m leaning against the fence, listening to the horse’s contented munching, lost in a memory when lights turn down the driveway. I recognize Billie’s truck, but it’s too dark to see inside.
Violet jumps out and lands on one foot. Obviously not wanting help to get out anymore after I dry-humped the hell out of her last night.
I cringe internally at the memory. Thirty-six going on sixteen, apparently. Next thing I know, I’ll be asking her to play just-the-tip.
Which is a terrible plan. Because, like I told her, I like her—and I shouldn’t. I like her as more than a friend, and that’s all we can be. I haven’t touched a woman in years, never mind had one touching me. I haven’t let anyone get close enough. It feels insurmountable now. Pathetic as it sounds.
But after two weeks in the same house as Violet, it’s all I can fucking think about.
“Hi,” she says shyly as she walks over to me. “What are you doing out here?”
“Just feeding the horse.”
Her head tilts imperceptibly. “I fed her before we left.”
The brown horse’s black globes for eyes flit up momentarily like she knows I’m a sucker for giving her more. Then she gets back to grinding her teeth and shoving the hay around. She looks happy, so who cares.
I just grunt and continue to stare at the little horse, expecting Violet to leave. Instead, she comes closer to the fence, a full post-length away from me, and leans against it. I can feel her gaze on me, like hands roaming over my body—soft and searching.
I don’t want to look back at her. To see that pale blond hair shining in the moonlight, those wide, indigo eyes boring into me, so full of unasked questions. I don’t want to think about Patrick’s hands on her, the way he cornered her, the things he said to her. He deserved the extra twist I gave his arm, the threat I whispered in his ear before I headed back upstairs. He deserved a lot worse than that.
And Violet? She deserves a man better than me. More honest than me. A hell of a lot more available than me. But the more time I spend around her, the less I care and the more I want.
“You sure you don’t like horses?” Amusement infuses her tone.
I scoff and keep staring at the brown filly.
“Not even a liiiittle bit?” She holds her thumb and finger up with little distance between them.
My cheek twitches, and I sigh, feeling the tension in my shoulders drain out to nothing. “Okay. If I had to like a horse, it would be this one.”
“Ha! I knew it.”
