A Photo Finish (Gold Rush Ranch, #2)

by Elsie Silver

My lungs constrict at the sight of her, the girl I haven’t been able to shake. Never mind Billie. I’m going to kill Patrick Cassel.

“For last night. I wasn’t myself. I just . . . don’t like being told what to do.” A smirk graces his full mouth now, and his look flicks from cool disinterest to . . . something else . . . as his eyes roam over my body, leaving a trail of heat in their wake. “That’s not how I remember it.”

Life courses through her so vividly and almost tangibly—like I could reach out and touch it, bottle it up and drink it, or just keep it. Possess it, knowing I have the option to consume it whenever I want. Money can’t buy this brand of vitality. This is bone deep—soul deep. She shines like the sun, golden and bright.

“Don’t be a stranger.”

I live in the shadows, and she’s like this ray of light that brightens my day. I’m so fucking greedy.

And I can’t help it. I laugh. A genuine laugh. It erupts from me like an animal that’s been caged up for too long. Like a racehorse shooting out of the gate. I watch her face transform from embarrassment to pure glee. The look on her face? It heats me from my core. Like a spark on dry grass that sends flames dancing across arid land. Fast and out of control. After all, wildfires are dangerous.

“What are you doing?” One hand on his hip, he holds the drill up to me like I’ve just asked the most obvious question in the world. “Building a shelter.” My brow wrinkles as I hear him confirm what Billie and Mira guessed. “I thought you hated horses?” “I don’t hate horses.” Pippy snorts and bats her eyelashes at him. Another one down, apparently. “Okay. You said you don’t like horses.” “Yup.” He grunts as he turns his back on me and crouches down to line up two boards. “But I like you.” And then he silently gets to work while I stand there watching him. Dumbstruck.

“Touch her, and I’ll kill you.” Cole’s voice is downright arctic.

Some nights, we type back and forth until I drift off with my phone in my hands. I wake up clinging to the device like it’s a fucking lifeline. Maybe it is. Maybe she is.

I should tell her she’s so much more. The thing that got me out of bed most mornings. My bright spot. My sunshine.

“Every time you laugh, it’s at me!” I chuckle because it’s true. “Yeah, but I laugh with you more than I’ve laughed in years.”

I want him to want me as badly as I want him.

“Do it,” I whisper, taunting him. “Please,” I add, begging him. And this time he doesn’t deny me. “Fuck it,” he rasps right as his lips descend onto mine. Hard and fast, strong and relentless—just like him.

Which is probably why I don’t miss his quiet whisper several minutes later. “What I was going to say is that this is perfect.”

I haven’t felt that level of relaxation in years. In the middle of a forest, in a shitty little shelter, I’m the most relaxed I’ve been in years. All because Violet is here in my arms.

I can hear her singing some god awful country song about riding a cowboy—completely off tune.

Tonight, I carried your limp body into my house. I know you’re just knocked out from the painkillers, but I felt sick all the same. I’ve carried limp bodies before and the thought of one being yours is almost more than I can take. I fell asleep in the hallway listening to you breathe. Today you talked me into going out for a drink at some shitty little pub. I had the most fun I’ve had in years. Today you moved out. I didn’t expect it to hurt this badly.

“You’re not broken. You’re perfect. And I’m a shitty fucking patchwork quilt. I’ve spent years picking up the tattered pieces of myself, every life event, every heartbreak, and slowly stitched it all back together. But I’m not good at sewing, Violet.”

“What are you doing?” I pant out, suddenly feeling breathless and completely immobile. Entirely unable to look away from his body in the warm glow of the darkened room. “Evening the playing field. You need to know what this is between us? It’s fucking everything.”

If Hilary was the poison, Violet is the antidote.

“Good girl. Every fucking inch.”

You don’t look at me like I’m tragic. You look at me like we’re inevitable.”

I’m definitely in love with Violet Eaton.

I can’t breathe. My vision blurs. The ground sways beneath me. And I bend over, pressing my hands into my knees as I drop my head and try to force my body to work again. I feel like an old car that needs a jump, a spark. I’m too fucking broken to even help her when she’s on the ground. But I can’t get my body to cooperate. I heave, one hand coming up over my mouth to hold it in. If she’s hurt. If she’s dead. It can’t happen. I only just found her. I only just found us.

“I know you see yourself as dark. But you aren’t. You’re swirling color, all different shades, a mosaic. You’re complicated and beautiful. And I’m not quitting on you, so you better not quit on me.”

“I want you. But you need to want you too. I can’t want you enough for the both of us.”

She’s like sunshine on my face. Warm and bright. I feel like I’ve been living in the shade, in a dark corner, and rather than dragging me kicking and screaming out of it—like so many people have tried to—she’s just shifted over a little bit to share her light.”

“I don’t want to live in the dark anymore.”

“But light is tricky. It slips through your fingers. It’s fleeting. It comes and goes. We never get to possess it; you can’t hold it in your hand. We just get to enjoy it. And if you can figure out a way to just let go and enjoy it, well, Cole, you’ll be one of the lucky ones.”

“And what if something happens to her?” “But what if nothing happens to her, and you spend the rest of your life missing out on all that light?” One voice in my head screams out louder than all the other ones. All the doubting ones. All the hateful ones. I don’t want to live in the dark anymore.

I love him. I should enjoy this win. But I’m pining after a guy I fell in love with like some wishy-washy teenager. “I knew you’d win,” the pony rider says from beside me. But his voice is . . . I look over, and my jaw goes slack. Because Cole Harding is on the sturdy quarter horse beside me. He’s holding Pippy’s rein. He’s on a horse. “Cat got your tongue?” He grins, looking so damn proud of himself.

“Did you think I’d miss it?” he asks with a tilt of his head. “I . . .” We slow to a trot and then a walk before coming to a complete stop in the middle of the track while other horses barrel past us to the exit gate. “I honestly wasn’t sure.” “Both my girls in one race? No chance.”

“I love you, Violet Eaton. I loved you before I ever met you. And God knows, I love you even more now.”

I soak it all up, knowing Cole is right there. And he’s not going anywhere.

Win or lose. She’s always smiling out there. Smiling right at me. Lighting me up. Because she’s my fucking sunshine.