Page 169 of The Brothers at Horseshoe Ranch

“Trust me, Sadie. No one will be teasing you,” I promised her. “Come on. Let’s go join them. Plus, I’m hungry. I need a burger.”

She nodded. “Let’s go.” I didn’t tell her that the main reason I wanted to go out was that I was curious if Beau had arrived yet. I was hungry, but I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat until I saw him. I really missed him, and I was worried about him.

I was worried that he was stressed out and upset. I knew this had to be about more than us having sex. It wasn’t like I’d become a stage-five clinger in a couple of days. Something else had to be going on.

We walked out of my room, down the corridor, and out to the back of the house. It smelled absolutely divine. There was something about the smell of grilling meat that just made me happy.

I looked around the backyard. It was packed. I hadn’t realized they were going to be inviting other people. As soon as we walked over to the grill, Chet whistled.

“Well, you two look amazing. Sadie, is that you?” His jaw dropped as he finally realized that the woman next to me was his childhood friend.

“Yes, Chet, it’s me. Like what you see?”

“You’re absolutely gorgeous,” he said and grinned. “Hey, Wyatt. Come over here!” he shouted.

“What, man? I’m playing Frisbee with Knox.”

“Come here, dude.”

“Oh, I’m coming.” Wyatt ran over and stopped next to Chet. “Okay, what did you want? I’m not doing the grill right now. I said I’d do it in an hour.”

“I know that. I just wanted you to see Olivia and Sadie.”

“Hey, Olivia.” He nodded at me and then he looked at Sadie. “Sadie?” His eyes widened as he looked her over. “What are you doing? You’re dressed up like Barbeque Barbie.”

“Excuse me?” she said.

“You look like Miss America or something. You know we’re on a ranch and not at the Four Seasons, right?”

“I’m not even dressed up, Wyatt. I just have makeup on.”

“Okay, is there someone coming that I should know about?”

“Sadie, ignore him. He’s just not used to you looking so hot,” Chet said.

“Well, thank you, Chet,” Sadie said pointedly.

Wyatt started to say something else, but I tuned them out when I saw Beau standing all the way to the right of us next to the fire pit.

“Hey, Sadie, I’ll speak to you later, okay? See you guys.” I headed over to Beau. He had started walking over to me as well, and we met in the middle.

“Hi.” He looked awkward.

“Hi,” I said.

He ran a hand through his hair and cleared his throat. “So I guess I wanted to apologize for not being around much since we . . . you know.”

“Yeah, I was starting to wonder if it was me,” I joked, hoping he would tell me that of course it wasn’t.

“I’ve just had a lot on my mind recently,” he said. He cleared his throat again. There was a really serious expression on his face, and I was starting to feel nervous. “Look, there’s something I want to tell you, Olivia.”

“What is it?”

“So, do you remember when—” He paused and then looked over my shoulder. “Oh, shit.”

I frowned. “Sorry, what?”

“Nothing. It’s just . . .”

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