Page 26 of If You Loved Me

“Are you alone?” The second attendant asked me right before he looked over his right shoulder and spit on the ground.

I cleared my throat, trying to prevent myself from gagging. “Yup,” was all I could manage to get out.

With a sweep of his arm, he directed me to the next open cab. As I slid across the bench seat, nerves fluttered in my stomach from the swinging of the cab.

This was a bad idea, I thought as I made the grave mistake of looking up and realizing that I would soon be at the very top of the Ferris wheel.

Just as I turned to the attendant to tell him I wanted to get off, a large body slid next to me.

Ranger.

Holy shit. Ranger Adams was sitting next to me on the Ferris wheel. How the hell did he sneak in? I didn’t see him anywhere in the line.

The attendant pulled the bar down and latched it into place, forcing Ranger to adjust as his large thighs were nearly hitting the bottom edge of the bar.

I squeaked as the Ferris wheel jolted forward and our cab, which I quickly assessed to be a little rusted and unkempt, was starting to sway forward and backward. There was no getting out of this now.

“Nervous?” Ranger’s husky voice was close to my ear. Grasping onto the bar, I settled back, feeling my shoulders meet his outstretched arm that was draped along the back of the cab. It was the first time I’d seen him without his cowboy hat since two summers ago at Deacon’s bonfire. Dark curls fanned out underneath his backward baseball cap. A black letter F outlined in white was stitched into the center of the red back strap. I wondered if he was aFalcons fan or if it was just a hat someone else gave to him.

I felt myself settle into his warmth as I looked up into those stormy eyes. “I’m, um, not the best with heights.”

His throaty laugh wrapped around me like a velvet blanket. “Why would you choose the Ferris wheel of all rides to get on alone then?”

We were still only a few feet from the ground as the attendant was loading people into the cab behind us, but my stomach still felt uneasy. “I thought I was feeling brave, but now that I’m here, I’m finding myself regretting my decision.”

Maybe it was my anxious mind playing tricks on me, but I swore he leaned towards me as he said, “Don’t worry, Sarah. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”

The crinkles on the edges of his eyes softened and I found myself unable to look away from him. From the beauty and pain that reflected back at me. Ranger Adams was the most incredible man I’d ever seen. It was true when I was a teenager and it was true now.

Countless questions clamored through my mind. I wanted to know this man. To understand what made him tick.

But the only words that stumbled from my lips were, “I’m sorry I asked you out the other day.”

The faint smile on his lips was clouded by the shadow of a frown as he turned away from me, staring at a random spot in front of us. Worry that I’d said the wrong thing clawed at my insides, making the already present anxiety much, much worse.

Just as I opened my mouth to take it back, I felt Ranger’s thumb skim the top of my shoulder and then he turned those blue eyes back on me.

“I shouldn’t have walked away from you like that. You deserve better. Better than I could ever give you.”

Willow was right. When he’d denied me, it had nothing to do with me at all. Ranger didn’t think he was good enough and knowing that made my heart hurt because he was so blindly unaware of just how much I wanted him.

“How do you know what you can give me if you don’t even try?”

“I’m not like the people you grew up with, Sarah. I spend most of my days in dusty old boots, herding cows. Until recently, I wasn’t even sure if I was going to be able to keep my family’s land. I don’t have anything to give you.”

“The only thing I want from you, Ranger, isyou.”

“Sarah…” My name was a prayer on his lips and when he stroked his fingers along the crook of my neck and shoulder, chills bloomed over my entire body.

I closed my eyes, soaking in the feeling of his palm splaying against the back of my neck, his fingertips playing with my hair. I had no idea it could feel like this. A simple touch that brought my entire body to life as though I’d never truly felt anything until this very moment.

When I opened my eyes, devastation was written across his face. Emotion made my words feel thick on my tongue as I reached for his other hand, feeling just how small mine was compared to his. “Please tell me you feel this…this,pullbetween us. And if you don’t, I promise I won’t ever ask you out again or make this a big deal.”

Back and forth, my gaze searched his and I realized this was the bravest I’d ever been. Braver than when I distanced myself from my family to pursue what made my heart happy. Braver than facing any of my basic fears, like getting on this damn Ferris wheel.

Laying myself bare to someone I felt such a strong connection toward with the risk of being rejected a second time felt…terrifying. But here I was, doing the damn thing because I could see how I affected him by the way he looked at me with such adoration it knocked the air from my lungs.

I could see the battle playing out in his mind—for reasons completely unknown to me, he was fighting this and I hated it.

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