Page 27 of Barn Burner (Love The Game #2)
Six Years Later
Brayden
With the summer sun heating my skin, I make the walk down from the house to the barn in search of Jesse.
He’s been out on a trail ride this morning, but I had to stay back and sort some shit out.
Since I hung up my skates from playing professional hockey last month, I haven’t been able to stop.
I’m in the middle of selling my house in Calgary, as well as working with lawyers to get a visa to stay here permanently.
The Bobcats organization is still helping me out, even if they are upset by my decision.
I waited until after we clinched our fourth Stanley Cup victory before announcing that I wouldn’t be renewing my contract and would be retiring completely.
A lot of people were surprised by my decision, but those close to me were not.
At thirty years old, I’ve been added to the “list of greats who retired too early,” but deep down, I know it was the right decision.
I feel like I’ve gained everything I could have wished for out of my career.
I still love hockey, but I don’t love it as much as I love Jesse and this life we’ve built on Huxley Creek Ranch.
Waking up next to him, riding horses, exploring the mountains and surrounding trails, then falling asleep in his arms is now my life’s purpose.
He’s given up so much for me while I continued to play, and now it’s my turn to give back to him.
Even if he is still annoyed I bought his mum those cute fluffy sheep she wanted for the petting farm.
Walking through the open door to the barn, I find Jesse getting Prince saddled up. The horse greets me with a loud exhale, then nudges Jesse’s back with his nose.
Jesse turns, and I’m rewarded with his gorgeous smile.
“Hey. Everything go okay?” he asks.
I nod. “Yeah. Just got to wait for it all to go through now.”
“Hopefully, you won’t have to wait long,” he says, then grabs my shirt and hauls me closer. His lips land on mine, and I loop my arms around his neck and melt against him like butter left out in the sun.
“Are you going out?” I murmur.
“ We are.”
I pull back slightly and raise a brow. “We are?”
“Mhm,” he hums, then tips his chin toward one of the stalls. “She’s ready for you.”
Spinning on my heel, I walk over to Mango, the quarter horse Jesse got me three years ago. She lets out a loud whinny when I step in front of her stable door, and I smooth my hand over her muzzle. “Hey, girl, you ready to go out?”
She whinnies again, and I chuckle. Jesse says he picked her because her personality is similar to mine in the sense that she’s cheeky and is very expressive.
I open the door to her stable and take hold of her reins to lead her outside. Sliding my foot into the stirrup, I pull myself up and settle into the saddle.
“You really look the part now, you know,” Jesse says when he joins me with Prince.
“What do you mean?”
His eyes travel down my body in a slow perusal before returning to my face. “Like a real cowboy.”
My grin is instantaneous.
Jesse took me to get my own hat shortly after he surprised me with Mango, claiming a ball cap wouldn’t protect me from the sun when we’re outside all day. So now I have my own fawn-coloured hat to go with the collection of plaid shirts I’ve stolen from Jesse’s closet.
“Where are we going?” I ask as Jesse leads us toward the foothills.
“It’s a surprise,” he says over his shoulder.
“Jesse,” I whine. “Give me something.”
He shakes his head and grunts, “No.”
“I haven’t even packed lube,” I argue, but he doesn’t answer except for his shoulders shaking with his laughter.
We pass through the trees and across one of the small streams at the base of the mountain.
It’s a route we take every so often, and an alternative route to the hilltop where Jesse took me that morning to watch the sunrise.
It takes us roughly an hour and a half to reach the plateau, and once we arrive at our usual spot, we both hop down.
He pulls out a blanket from one of the saddle bags and lays it down on the ground before returning with containers of cheese, fruits, and crackers.
“Oh, a little cheese board on the mountain. You know the way to my heart, Mr. Huxley.”
I sit down on the blanket and make a beeline for the container of cheese, but he slaps my hand away.
“So impatient,” he grumbles.
“Hey, it’s cheese! You expect me to be patient with cheese? It’s like asking me to be patient when you’re standing naked in front of me.” I shake my head at him. “Not gonna happen.”
He laughs softly, rolling his eyes in that adorable way he does. He takes more containers from the saddle bags, then takes a seat next to me. We eat in a companionable silence, listening to the sounds of the wilderness coming from the dense forest in the valley below.
“Should be any minute now,” he says once we finish the food and have cleared our rubbish away in the saddle bags to take back with us to the ranch.
“What should be?” I ask, but as the words leave my mouth, I see it.
The sky is gradually turning a deep, vibrant orange with streaks of pink and red as the sun begins to disappear behind the mountain peaks.
I can’t remember the number of sunrises we’ve managed to watch over the years, but I can count on one hand the number of sunsets.
“Wow,” I breathe, unable to tear my gaze from the beautiful scene. Even six years on, I’m still so awe-inspired by all of this. The land, the views.
This man.
I turn back to Jesse, about to tell him that it never fails to impress me, but the words die on my tongue. Instead, my mouth drops open.
He’s down on one knee, holding a black band between his fingers.
“Jesse…” I say barely above a whisper, my breath catching in my throat.
“Brayden, I’ve wanted to do this for quite a while, but I wanted the time to be right,” he begins.
“I’m so proud of you and everything you’ve accomplished.
Being by your side while you accomplish your dreams has been one of the most rewarding things I’ve ever done.
” He swallows roughly. “If you had told me that the man who I thought was dead on the side of the road would end up being the best thing to happen to me, I would’ve laughed in your face. ”
I let out a choked laugh, and he grins.
“But you are, Brayden. You’re everything to me. You’re my sunrise. My beauty, providing endless hope and optimism, and you’ve become my purpose,” he says, then removes his hat to set it on the ground beside him. “If it’s alright with you, would you do me the honour of being my husband?”
“Yes!” I shout, causing Prince and Mango to snap their heads our way. With a shaky hand, I wipe the tears from my face and nod rapidly. “Yes! I want to be your husband so fucking bad.”
Jesse’s face lights up in a wide grin as I drop to my knees in front of him. He takes hold of my hand and slides the ring onto my finger. I stare at it, and more tears fall as I blink.
“Fuck, I love you so much,” I sob and throw my arms around his neck. He wraps his arms around my back, holding me close to his chest like he always does.
My protector. My lover. My cowboy.
“I love you, too, Brayden.” He cups my face between both hands and kisses me. “Now, how do you feel about heading back, putting these two to bed, then I can show you just how much I love you until the sun comes back up?”
Sitting back on my haunches, I run my fingers through the long strands of his dark hair, which is now threaded with silver. “I’d say that sounds like the perfect idea.”
As we pack up the blanket and head back toward the ranch, I think about how far I’ve come to get here.
In a way, I guess I have the media to thank, because without them tearing me apart, I wouldn’t have run away from the world and found Jesse.
Jesse, who ended up putting me back together, stronger than before.
Jesse, who supported me through the highs and the lows and never once allowed me to doubt my worth.
Jesse, the man I’m going to marry and spend the rest of my life with.
I thought I wouldn’t be able to reach a higher point in my life than the times I lifted the Stanley Cup, but I was wrong.
The highest point is this.
Being loved by Jesse Huxley, and now I’m going to spend the rest of my life with him as his husband.
Nothing could top this, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
THE END
Interested in finding out how Jude and Cody got together? Read about them in Becca Steele’s Offside Play
And does Jay Brookbank really hates Marek Myers? Read about them in EM Denning’s The Poster Boy