Page 19 of Craving Her Cowboy
The plan was to hit the far side of the stables, tidy up the tack room, then disappear into the back pastures for the rest of the morning. No cabin rebuild, no lunch in the mess, no unnecessary run-ins with anybody, least of all him.
She left her cabin quietly, shutting the door behind her without a sound, then headed out on the gravel track. The ranch was a glassy green, dew heavy enough to weigh the grass flat. The world at this hour belonged to birds and livestock, and Asha liked it that way, especially the quiet.
At the corner of the hay shed, she paused, scanned the horizon, and spotted him. Gavin was already outside, which meant he’d either skipped his workout or had trouble sleeping. The sight of him in front of her, tall, broad-shouldered, hands already clenched into fists, sent a crackle of static up her spine. She ducked back into the shadow and waited.
He didn’t look her way. She watched as he crossed over to the main fence line, grabbed a post-hole digger, and went to work. She could hear the clunk of the tool hitting earth, could see the way he braced his boot and leaned in, muscling the old wood loose.
Asha waited until he was deep into the rhythm, then cut across the paddock, keeping to the low spots and the lee of the sheds. At the back door of the stables, she slowed, forced her breathing to even out. If any of the hands were in early, she didn’t see them.
Inside, the air was sharp with manure and hay and horse sweat, a smell she usually found grounding. Today, it barely registered. She went straight to the first stall, where the roan gelding was already pacing, ears pricked for breakfast. She tossed two flakes of hay into the bin, then checked the water. The movements were efficient, stripped of the usual gentle attention she gave the horses. It wasn’t that she was angry. Not at all. Instead, her reactions seemed distant, as if there was a barrier separating her from what was happening.
She moved down the row, completing tasks with efficient focus. Grain for the foals, fresh bedding for the old broodmare, a full muck of the sickbay stall. If a horse tried to nose her for affection, she redirected its head with a flat palm. She caught herself brushing too hard, as if she could scrape away more than just dirt.
When she finished her circuit and checked the yard again, Gavin was still out front. But now he was working the next section of fence, sweat darkening the gray of his t-shirt. Every time he bent, the muscles of his back flexed under the fabric. She caught herself watching him a bit too closely, then forced her eyes away and headed for the tack room. She would die on this hill before she admitted it, but his words a few days ago had hurt her deeply.
He immediately went on the defensive and pushed her away. Asha wasn’t expecting a love declaration, but his first inclination was to avoid her. And when he did approach her, it was to tell her their night meant nothing. That she was only a fuck. Tears welled in her eyes at the thought and the memoryof that night. Being in his arms had felt so good. She thought he had seen the woman beneath the scars. Beneath the tough exterior. It had all been a lie. And she shouldn’t feel this way. It wouldn’t do any good to wish for something different.
Walking into the tack room, her eyes widened. The space was a disaster. Somebody had upended a bin of leather halters, and it looked like a tornado had hit the shelf of supplements and salves. Asha squatted and started sorting, her hands moving faster than her brain. She lined up bottles, stacked brushes, relaced a bridle that had come unwound. Every task was a way not to think, not to feel the skin-crawling tension that followed her like a shadow.
Somewhere outside, a door slammed. Asha froze, fingers wrapped around a tin of hoof oil. Footsteps, then the voices of two ranch hands talking.
“Boss wants the whole east pasture checked before noon,” one said.
“Yeah, yeah. You see McAllister? He’s already got half the posts done.”
“Man’s like a damn robot. Never stops.”
Asha smirked at their words, but it didn’t reach her eyes. That was one way to describe Gavin. A robot. Devoid of feeling and emotion.
She set the hoof oil on the shelf and closed the door, careful not to let the latch click too loud. She could hear the men walk away, their boots crunching the gravel. She took a breath, then another. It did nothing for the band of pressure around her chest.
For the next hour, she stayed inside, shifting from one meaningless job to the next. She patched a saddle pad, re-braided a tangled lead rope, even polished the brass on the door handles. Every few minutes she checked the windows, looking for Gavin’s shape out in the distance. She caught him three moretimes: once talking to Andy by the corral gate, once bent over the workbench in the machine shed, and once she saw him heading straight for the barn.
She panicked and ducked behind the feed bins, heart going double-time as his footsteps drew closer. He paused at the barn entrance, maybe thinking about coming in, but then turned and walked off. She stayed hidden for another two minutes, forehead pressed to the splintered wood, counting her breaths. By the time she appeared, her jaw hurt from clenching. Her shoulders sat up by her ears, a knot of muscle refusing to let go. She rubbed the scar above her eyebrow which was an old habit she’d thought she’d broken years ago, but which had come back after their last conversation.
The morning wore on, the light rising and making the dust in the barn shine. She busied herself with a final check on the horses, going down the line for a second round of feed and water. This time, she slowed a little, letting herself linger on the animals’ faces. The warmth of the mare’s nose in her palm, the flicker of a tail, the soft chuff of breath. She let herself feel it, just for a second.
Then she heard boots on gravel, close now, and the tension slammed back in. She yanked her hand away, closed the stall, and retreated to the tack room, slamming the door and locking it behind her. She wasn’t ready to face him just yet. Maybe she was embarrassed by her own actions. Hiding. Avoiding. She wasn’t ashamed of what they had done, but she also wasn’t a fan of rejection.
She sat on the old milking stool, back pressed to the wall, and tried to remember the last time she’d felt this raw.
She closed her eyes and stayed there, counting backwards from ten, then twenty, then thirty. Eventually her breath evened out.
Asha skipped the mess at lunch, knowing the odds of running into Gavin in close quarters were high. Instead, she microwaved two pieces of leftover sausage in her cabin, then sat cross-legged on her couch to eat. She checked the news, flicked through her phone’s home screen, and tried to ignore the gnaw of old anxiety gnawing at her ribs.
Halfway through the second piece, her phone vibrated. The number was from a number she didn’t recognize. She stared at it for two rings, then thumbed the green icon, bringing it to her ear.
“Hello,” she said, voice tight but steady.
“Hello, is this Asha Monroe?” A female voice, bright, professional, practiced.
“Speaking.”
“Hi, this is Melissa Carter, I’m the director at New Direction Vets in Boulder, Colorado. Do you have a minute?”
Asha straightened in anticipation. “Of course.”
“I know we spoke with you a few months ago about joining our team,” Melissa continued, “but our funding just came through and you were at the top of our candidate list. Your experience is exactly what we need to develop the new trauma program for women veterans. We’d like to offer you an opportunity to join our team. Would you be available to start in three weeks?”
