She doesn't budge. Just keeps chewing with the arrogant confidence that comes with a thousand-pound advantage.
The earthy, animal scent grounds me after a night of perfume and political double-speak. There's something almost refreshing about a problem I can see and name, even if I can't immediately solve it.
The heifer takes another bite of my flowers and settles in deeper, her eyes saying what I already know—some standoffs can't be won with words alone.
A figure appears at the edge of my yard, but I don't need to look at him to know who it is—my traitorous heart recognizes the way he moves through the world like he belongs everywhere he steps.
"Do you want some help?"
Wyatt's voice is quiet, stripped of all the easy confidence I remember. When I finally turn, his hat is in his hand and exhaustion's written in the lines around his eyes. He looks like he hasn't slept, and he moves like he's approaching a spooked animal.
"No." The word comes out final. "I don't need your help."
He flinches but doesn't move closer, and somehow that makes everything worse. The way he's holding himself back—it's killing me. My hands are shaking, and being this close to him only magnifies the ache in my chest until I can barely breathe. Everything inside me is fracturing.
Part of me wants to collapse into his arms, to let him fix this impossible mess with a promise, even if I don’t trust him to keep it. Part of me wants to scream at him for making me believe in something he had no right offering and yet every part of me still wants to love him.
Instead, I back away, wrapping my arms around my middle, while the cattle chew methodically through what's left of the flowers. I try to pull myself together, but my voice shakes.
"Do you have any idea what this means for your family?" The words come out desperate, higher than I intended. I'm not talking about his cows getting out and he knows it.
Wyatt doesn't defend himself. Doesn't explain. Just stands there in the sun, taking every word like he deserves it, and his silence makes me want to scream. The shadows under his eyes tell of a sleepless night, and the slump in his shoulders—so different from his usual confident stance—reveals a man carrying an impossible weight. I've seen him thrown from bulls and walk away without flinching, but this is breaking him in ways no physical injury could. Part of me wants to reach out, to ease some of that burden even though I'm drowning in my own pain. It's like watching a wildfire consume a forest—devastating, unstoppable, and somehow my fault for caring too much about what burns. No matter what happened in Cheyenne that night, the consequences are carving lines into his face that weren't there yesterday, and despite everything, that knowledge cuts deeper than I want to admit.
"I've been fielding calls all night," I continue, my composure completely shattered. "Disappointed ranchers, embarrassed politicians. Martinez's people started damage controlbefore dawn, spinning the story their way. The only one who hasn’t called to yell at me is Cash Thornton and I’m guessing the unknown number on my phone is his agent who will yell for him."
A particularly bold cow wanders past us toward what's left of the herb garden while I stand here barefoot and broken.
"The Senator's office isn't taking my calls." My voice cracks on the words. "Your mother trusted me to save this ranch, and I can't even save a stinking sunflower from your family's livestock."
I’m a hot mess with a side of crazy. The competent professional who could take on senators and win has dissolved into this—a woman who can't even get cattle out of her driveway. My mother would be so ashamed.
"I can't fix this, Wyatt." The admission tears out of me like something vital being ripped away, leaving raw anger. "I don't know how to save any of it."
Anger is safer than admitting how much this is killing me, safer than acknowledging I don’t know how to lose him and still go on with my life. It’s all I have left, and even that's fracturing around the edges.
"I have to marry her, or we'll lose everything."
"What?" My voice comes out barely a whisper.
Wyatt's eyes are hollow, empty as a winter sky. "Martinez threatened to bankrupt my family. If I don't marry Brittney, he'll bleed us to death."
I stare at him, seeing the impossible position he's trapped in with horrible clarity. The ranch that's been in his family for five generations, everything his ancestors fought and died to build—all of it hanging in the balance.
"Have you told your family?" I ask. "About Martinez blackmailing you?"
He shakes his head, that stubborn Halloway pride evident even now. "No."
"Wyatt, they need to know. This affects all of them." My voice rises with urgency. "They might be able to help, to find another way—"
"I made this mess." His jaw tightens, the words coming out clipped and final. "It's on me to clean it up."
I recognize the determination in his eyes—the same look he gets before climbing onto a bull that's never been ridden. He won't budge on this, won't distribute the weight of his burden across shoulders that would gladly help carry it. Part of me wants to argue, to force him to see reason, but I understand something fundamental about the man standing before me. Wyatt needs to face this on his terms, needs to be the one to protect what he loves. Letting go of control now would cost him the last shred of dignity he's clinging to.
"Maybe you do have to marry her." I choke on a sob.
It's true, and we both know it.
I'm crying openly now, no longer hiding behind anger. The tears come hot and fast, and I'm unable to stop them. A particularly large bull has wandered close, as if sensing our emotional devastation, and he stands there watching us, curious about the chaos.