Page 237 of Wild Then Wed
But I don’t think that anymore. Now I think love is messier. Quieter. I think it sneaks up on you when you’re washing dishes together or sharing a blanket or saying nothing at all. It’s someone pulling you closer in a crowded room just because they can. It’s someone choosing you even when you’re not at your best. Maybe especially then.
It’s someone showing up again and again, even when you try to give them reasons not to. It’s someone like Sawyer—gentle, kind, a little bit battered by life, and still choosing to stay.
Love, in the end, is just two people, a little broken and a little brave, feeling their way toward each other in the dark.
And maybe that’s what makes it real. Not how certain it looks from the outside, but how safe it feels once you’re inside it.
Because that’s what Sawyer’s done for me.
He didn’t just make space for the parts of me I usually keep quiet—he waited there, patiently, until I felt brave enough to bring them out. He never tried to fix me or figure me out. He just saw me—really saw me—and made it feel like it was okay to stop hiding. And somewhere in all of that, I started to see myself differently, too.
One who didn’t shut the idea of love out completely. One who still believed in soft things, in starting over, in letting someone in and not immediately bracing for the worst.
And I’m so glad it’s him.
Of all the people in the world—I’m so glad it’s him.
Chapter 41
WREN
FOUR MONTHS LATER
April in Montana can’t seem to make up its mind. Some mornings, frost still clings to the windows, and the sky hangs low and gray, like winter’s refusing to loosen its grip. But today, the sun showed up early, stretching across the horizon. The sky is that soft, washed-out blue that only happens when the air’s still cold but pretending not to be, while thin clouds drift lazily overhead, not in any hurry to go anywhere.
My breath fogs on the glass, but the snow in the yard is starting to retreat in patchy stretches, revealing dead grass and muddy ruts and, if you look closely, a few stubborn wildflowers trying to nudge their way up.
From the front window, I can see the mountains in the distance—snow still dusting the peaks, soft and powdery up high where the sun hasn’t quite reached. Closer in, the pastures are slowly shifting from white to brown to yellow to something almost green. A few of the cows are gathered near the fence, and one of the barn cats is curled on the porch rail.
I wrap my hands around my mug and sink into the couch, my legs tucked under me, still in my sweatpants and Sawyer’s hoodie. I’m so tired my bones ache.
Lately, I’ve been bouncing between both ranches—helping Boone and the hands with the end of calving season over at Wilding Ranch, then heading back here to keep up with training sessions. Anna’s taken over most of the groundwork on Hart Ranch, and she’s been amazing—steadfast, detail-oriented, naturally good with all of the horses. I check in and supervise where I need to, but for the most part she’s running it like it’s her own.
This week, Nora’s kindergarten class came for a field trip at Hart Ranch, and it was mayhem in the best way. Estelle and Emily helped herd the kids toward the barn while Sawyer taught them fun facts about the animals. I held baby bottles filled with warm milk while twenty sets of tiny hands tried to feed the calves, giggling when their fingers got nibbled. Nora beamed the whole time, proudly introducing Uncle Sawyer like he was famous.
I glance toward the mantle.
The painting of the sunflowers is still there—bright and full, reminding me of August summers. But now it hangs beside something new: a painting of a bouquet of violets, delicate and layered, with shadows tucked into the petals just so. It’s the painting I gave Sawyer for his birthday last month. It’s my favorite thing I’ve ever made.
He framed the note I left with it too. It sits right beneath the canvas now:
I read once that violets mean remembrance and faithfulness. And I used to think that was too sad for a flower—too heavy. But now I think it’s beautiful. Because there’s something holy in remembering the ones we’ve loved, and something brave in choosing to keep living after them. You lost Violet and still found a way to be gentle. To stay kind. You never stoppedshowing up, even when it hurt. And I think that’s what love looks like on you. The kind that stays. The kind that grows back.
He didn’t say much when he opened it, but his eyes brimmed with tears. He looked at it for a long time, then at me, then wrapped his arms around me and didn’t let go for a while.
And now it’s here. Part of this house. Part of us.
The mountains are bright this morning. Bright in a way that only shows up after a stretch of gray. And maybe that’s where we are, too. Somewhere in the in-between—still cold, still a little raw, but warming. Patching over. Starting to bloom.
I stretch, slowly, feeling the tight pull of muscles that haven’t really rested in weeks. My neck pops. My lower back protests. I set the mug down and push up from the couch with a soft grunt.
“Come on, girl,” I call out, and Winnie’s ears perk instantly from her spot near the back door. She scrambles to her too-big paws like she’s been waiting for this invitation all morning—which, knowing her, she has.
She’s a three-month-old Australian Kelpie with over-sized ears and an attitude far too big for her tiny body. We’re training her up to be a working dog eventually—herding, boundary watching, the usual—but right now she’s mostly just learning basic commands and how not to chew through the leg of the coffee table.
Sawyer got her right after New Year’s, after I’d mentioned, half-joking, that Hank might like a friend. I hadn’t meantimmediately, but two days later, he came home with her in his coat. Winnie was sleepy and floppy and smelled like hay and peanut butter, and Sawyer just handed her to me like it was the most normal thing in the world to bring home a new dog.
Hank has tolerated her ever since. Barely. He sighs dramatically every time she so much as looks at him, like he can’t believe the indignity of having to share his humans witha toddler in dog form. But he lets her curl up beside him when she’s cold, and once, when she whined in the middle of the night, I caught him trying to nudge her crate door open so she wouldn’t cry.
