Page 50 of Untruly With You

The bachelor and bachelorette groups gathered during our ride, and we make our way to them, knees wobbly.

When Wells grins, he actually looks his age of twenty-three. “Quite the show,” he says, tightening his arm’s grip around Cassidy’s shoulders.

Sutton hugs me from behind again, planting a kiss atop my head. The adrenaline of the bull ride is replaced by the now familiar hum of electricity in me that accompanies Sutton.

Wells is still smiling at us approvingly.

“As if he could doubt us now,” Sutton murmurs, almost to himself.

The night carries on with a few more drinks, plenty of laughter, and of course, the occasional awkward comment from a bridesmaid. We eventually leave the bar and pile into Sutton’s truck, exhaustion settling over us. Sutton hasapparently sobered up enough to take the driver’s seat. Cassidy is in the backseat with Wells. Within minutes, she is half-asleep against his shoulder. In similar fashion, Frankie, seated on my right, settles against the door. Even with everyone else’s eyes closed, Sutton reaches over and holds my hand the entire drive home.

When we finally get back to our room at the ranch, Sutton and I exchange tired grins, both of us too tired to do much more than kick off our shoes and collapse onto the bed. My adrenaline is beyond expended, and the energy from earlier in the night has dissipated, leaving behind a comfortable stillness.

Sutton reaches to the bedside table and grabs his prescription bottle. I snatch it from him. “You can’t take a sleeping pill if you’ve been drinking.”

He grabs it back, popping it open. “I didn’t have a drink all night,” he says, grinning enough for his dimples to carve into his cheeks. “And if I don’t take this, there’s not a chance in hell I’d get a blink of sleep tonight.”

Sure enough, soon Sutton is sound asleep, and I’m doing enough overthinking for the both of us.

21

LAINE

My boots crunchagainst the rocks along the worn dirt trail. It’s nearly midday, and the sun is warm against my face. I’ve been walking for at least ten minutes by now, so I pull Sutton’s note from the pocket of my coveralls, to be sure I read it right.

We’re going to work on prepping the wedding location today. You are welcome to join if you like and if you aren’t too busy with work. Take the trail directly west of the house and you’ll find us.

At the bottom of the paper, Sutton continued,

I hope you sleep well.

That last bit is in pencil while the rest is in pen, so he must have added it later—probably whenhe realized I was sleeping in late for the first time since arriving in West River. He didn’t sign the paper. He didn’t need to. I spent months studying Sutton’s Shakespeare notes and reading his feedback on essay drafts. I trace my fingers across the handwriting, smiling down at it. It’s only been a couple weeks since our last tutoring session, four months since we first met, yet it feels like I’ve known him for a lifetime.

Wrestling with my thoughts last night, I forgot to plug my phone in to charge. When Sutton got up, presumablymuchearlier than me, he closed the curtains and even left a glass of water on my bedside table, along with the note. I slept in hours later than expected because, thanks to my overthinking, I didn’t fall asleep until the early hours of the morning. After I eventually woke up, I returned my parents’ calls, leaving out some details from my recap, like the tandem mechanical bull riding and the night we went line dancing.

Those evenings probably sounded harmless.

But they definitely didn’t feel that way.

After a few more minutes of walking on the trail, I hear the whirring of a lawnmower. As I reach the top of the next hill, another small pocket of the valley opens up. I slow to a stop and let out a small gasp, awestruck.

At the front edge of the clearing, emerald grass flutters in the breeze. Halfway through the small valley, a vast stretch of lavender fans out, a canvas of vibrant purple that extends all the way to the next hill. The lavender sways, a slow sea of waving color. And thesmell. It’s nothing like the artificial version I’ve experienced in detergent and cheap candles. Like most everything at Silver Ridge Ranch, it’s pure and raw and real.

The entire family works together. Frankie and Sutton unload long benches from a flatbed trailer under Magnolia’s direction. Wells trims the white-blossomed trees on theoutskirts of the grassy area. And Hank tuts along the back edge of the grass on the lawnmower.

There's something incredibly serene about this moment, about the way the family works together. It's as if the ranch itself is alive, its heart beating with the labor of those who care for it. Had I not already known about the strife between Sutton, Hank, and Wells, I never would guess it looking out at them now.

I gravitate to the lavender field, drawn by an irresistible curiosity. With each step, the sweet scent of lavender becomes more pronounced, wrapping around me. Bees flit from flower to flower. The clouds above are so perfectly white and fluffy they look like they belong in a Pixar movie. I’m not sure how long I stand there, entranced, before I hear a voice behind me.

“What d’ya think?” Wells comes to my side, hands on his sides as he watches the lavender shift in the breeze. His pale eyes take on their purple tone, turning periwinkle. Seeing his content smile, it’s hard to remember the harsh, tense Wells I’ve come to know.

“I think it’s the most beautiful thing I’ve laid my eyes on.” My voice is as soft as the rustling leaves in the tree overhead. “Are there a lot of fields like this on the ranch?”

“This is the only one. I planted it five years ago.”

“I didn’t imagine you as a big floral kind of guy,” I say.

A layer of dirt constantly covers Wells. He’s loud and tough and, considering what Sutton told me, was quite the rebel for a while. He’s the last person in the family I can imagine planting flowers.

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