Chapter 6: A Professional Lie
The dawn at the Livingston ranch was a slow, quiet masterpiece. Mist lingered in the low places, bleeding gold as the sun crested the distant mountains. The air was cool and carried the thick, sweet scent of hay from the open loft and the damp earth of the freshly watered paddock. Derek leaned against the rough-hewn post of the stable, a second cup of coffee going cold in his hand. He’d been up for two hours. Fed the horses. Cleaned tack that didn’t need cleaning. Checked his stitches in the bathroom mirror–twice.
Captain, the old quarter horse, dozed in his stall, his flank rising and falling in a steady rhythm. There was no hoof abscess. There had never been.
The crunch of gravel under tires was an electric shock to the serene morning. Sabrina’s silver sedan navigated the pothole-riddled drive with cautious delicacy. She parked a pointed distance from his mud-splattered truck, as if avoiding contamination.
He didn’t move from his post, just watched her step out. She was a different creature in the soft morning light. Gone was the rodeo’s backdrop of chaos; here, against the sprawling fields and his weathered barn, her city edges seemed sharper. She wore durable khakis, clean boots, and a simple navy shirt. Her hair was down, a cascade of copper catching the early sun. It looked softer than he’d imagined. She carried her professional bag like a shield.
“Morning,” he called, his voice echoing slightly in the still air.
“Livingston.” She gave him a curt nod, her eyes already scanning the property, assessing. She stopped a few feet away, not offering a hand. “Where’s the patient?”
“Stall three.” He pushed off the post and led the way, the silence between them filled with the morning chirp of sparrows and the crunch of their footsteps. He slid the stall door open. Captain lifted his head, snorted softly, and ambled over, nosing at Derek’s jacket pocket for the apple slice he knew was there.
Sabrina stepped in, her demeanor shifting instantly. Her focus became singular, gentle. She ran a hand down Captain’s neck, murmuring soft nonsense words. “Hey, big guy. Let’s take a look at you.” She nodded to Derek. “Which hoof?”
“Left front.”
She bent, lifting the hoof with a practiced ease Captain immediately granted. She cleaned the sole with a pick from her pocket, leaning close. She examined it, her fingers probing. She set it down, patted the horse’s shoulder, and picked up the right front. Then the left again. A minute ticked by. Then two.
She straightened. Brushed a stray piece of straw from her knee. When she looked at him, the professional mask was still on, but her eyes had changed. They were flinty.
“There’s no abscess.”
“No.”
“There’s no swelling, no heat, no pinpoint tenderness. The hoof wall is solid.”
“I know.”
She didn’t blink. “You know.”
“Yeah.”
“You lied to get me out here.”
“I did.”
The admission hung in the dusty air of the stable. Captain, sensing the shift, shifted his weight and let out a long, wet blow. Sabrina’s jaw tightened. She picked up her bag, slung it over her shoulder. The movement was stiff, final. “Consultation fee is eighty dollars. You can mail a check to the clinic.”
She turned to leave.
“I wanted to see you without the blood,” he said. The words stopped her, but she didn’t turn around. He took a step closer, his voice dropping, stripped of its usual easy charm. “In that tent, I was just another idiot cowboy who mistook his skull for a bull rope. Here, I’m not. Here, I’m the guy who mends fences and pays his taxes on time. Here, I have a horse that’s twenty years old because I can’t bear to put him down even though he’s been pasture-bound for five.” He paused. “I wanted you to see that guy.”
Sabrina slowly turned. Her expression was unreadable, but the anger was there, simmering just beneath a layer of ice. “That’s manipulative and transparent.”
“Probably.”
“And you think this is a better version? The version that tricks a professional into a house call under false pretenses?”
“No,” he admitted, running a hand through his hair. The gesture was frustrated, less controlled. “It’s just the version that didn’t know how else to get a second look from you after you made your ‘no clients’ rule so damn clear.”
“Rules exist for a reason.”
“I’m breaking the rule,” he said, simply. “Not the bone. Not this time. I’m just asking you to look at something else. The… the context. Me. In my context.”
She stared at him. The morning sun sliced through a crack in the stable boards, illuminating the floating dust motes between them. She seemed to be weighing the honesty in his words against the deception of his actions. “You’re unbelievable.”
“I’ve been told.”
A long silence stretched out, broken only by the contented munching of Captain on his haynet. The initial flash of her anger seemed to be fading, replaced by a wary, calculating curiosity.
“So this,” she said, waving a hand vaguely between them and the perfectly healthy horse. “This is your big play. The romantic ‘come see my normal life’ gambit.”
“Was it working?” He couldn’t stop the slight, hopeful grin.
“No.” The answer was swift. But she didn’t walk away. She set her bag down again, leaning against the stall door. “It’s presumptuous. And arrogant.”
“Also probably true.”
She shook her head, but a faint, reluctant smile touched the corner of her mouth. It was gone in a second. “You stitched-up fools are all the same. You think the world operates on charm and daring.”
“Doesn’t it?”
“Not the part of the world that keeps animals alive.” She looked past him, out the stable door to the golden-lit fields. “My world runs on predictable protocols and proven science. Not on… whatever this is.” She gestured at the space between them again.
“Feels a little like chemistry to me.”
“That’s the adrenaline talking. Or a concussion.”
“Stitches are fine. Head’s clear.” He took another step. They were close now. He could see the faint freckles across the bridge of her nose, the subtle pulse in her throat. “Sabrina.”
The use of her first name made her eyes snap back to his. A direct hit.
“I lied. I’m sorry. It was a dumb idea. But the wanting to see you part… that wasn’t a lie. That’s the truest thing I’ve done all week.”
Her breath hitched, just slightly. The professional veneer was cracking, revealing the woman beneath—a woman who was intrigued, exasperated, and undeniably attracted. She looked away, focusing on a rusted bridle hanging on a nail. “You live in a world of eight-second increments. My life is built in decades. The life expectancy of a good practice. The lifespan of the animals I treat. They don’t align.”
“Says who?”
“Says logic. Says every bad decision I’ve ever made started with ignoring a glaring incompatibility.”
“Maybe,” he conceded, his voice low. “But the best decision I ever made was climbing onto a bull logic told me I couldn’t ride. Sometimes the glaring thing is just… glare.”
She finally looked back at him, and this time she held his gaze. The war in her eyes was visible–caution against curiosity, logic against the slow, magnetic pull he exerted. The stable was quiet, warm, private.
“I don’t do reckless,” she stated, but it sounded more like a reminder to herself.
“I’m not asking you to.” He meant it. The realization surprised him. “I’m just asking you to have a cup of coffee. On the porch. No bulls. No blood. Just… coffee.”
She studied his face, her eyes tracing the line of the fresh stitches above his brow, then dropping to his mouth, then back to his eyes. She was reading him, like she’d read Captain’s hoof.
“Just coffee,” she repeated, softly.
“Swear.”
Another long moment passed. Then, a nearly imperceptible nod. “All right.”
He didn’t let the victory show on his face. He just nodded back, his heart hammering against his ribs. He led the way out of the stable, into the blinding, beautiful morning light.
The porch was warm. He fetched a fresh pot and two clean mugs. They sat in the worn wooden chairs, a respectable distance apart, watching the mist burn completely off the lower field. For a while, they just drank in silence, the tension of the stable softening into something quieter, more fragile.
“He’s a good horse,” she said finally, nodding toward the paddock where Captain now stood, soaking up the sun.
“The best,” Derek replied. “Carried me through my first championship. Now he carries my guilt for retiring him too late and not early enough.”
It was a raw, unvarnished piece of honesty, offered without a charming grin to deflect it. Sabrina glanced at him, her expression softening further. “You love him. That’s what matters.”
“Yeah,” he said, staring into his coffee. “I guess it is.”
The conversation unspooled from there, hesitant at first, then gaining purchase. They talked about her residency in New York, the shocking silence of the country nights that still kept her awake. He told her about buying this run-down spread five years ago, the backbreaking work of making it his. She admitted she missed reliable Thai food. He confessed he’d never had it.
It wasn’t flirting. It was something better, rarer: a careful, mutual mapping of territories.
When her mug was empty, she stood. “I have a spay clinic at eleven.”
He stood too, not crowding her. “Thanks for the coffee. And the… consultation.”
She smiled then, a real one, small but genuine. It transformed her face. “You’re a terrible liar, Livingston. But your coffee is passable.”
“High praise.”
She walked to her car, and he followed, stopping a few feet behind. She opened the door, then paused, looking back at him, at the ranch, at the morning they’d just shared. The professional was back, but there was a new warmth behind her eyes.
“The stitches look good,” she said. “Keep them clean.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She got in, started the engine. As she reversed, she rolled down the window. “And Derek?”
He leaned down. “Yeah?”
“Next time you want a second look…” She met his eyes, a spark of that same challenge he’d seen in the tent flashing in hers. “Just ask.”
She drove away, the sedan kicking up a small plume of dust that hung in the air, catching the sun like powdered gold.
Derek stayed there, long after the sound of the engine had faded into the hills. The emptiness of the house behind him didn’t press in like it usually did. It felt like a space waiting to be filled. He touched the tight embroidery of stitches on his brow.
Just ask.
He grinned, a slow, deep smile that reached his eyes. For the first time in a long time, the next eight seconds weren’t the only thing that mattered.