Ten Year Grudge

It was not easy getting ready to go to events. I was obsessive about leaving anything behind. I brought three extra halters...per horse, six extra buckets, three extra pairs of clothes for me, two extra sets of stirrup leathers, extra saddle pads, every type of medicine, boots, and ointment I owned, an extra pitchfork and muck bucket, an extra hose, two sets of brushes, and an extra bridle for both western and English...and that was just the stuff that fit in the tack room of my two-horse trailer.
"We've got everything Nik," Ace said as he tossed his own duffel on top of mine.
"You say that now. Then we get to Timonium and we left something here."
"Are you always this obsessive?"
"Yes," I practically snarled.
"Okay let's take a deep breath here-"
"Bite me," I snapped, "it's my event. If I want to obsess, then dammit, let me obsess."
Ace put his hands up. "This is just a new side of you. You've always been so cool and collected-"
"I AM COOL!!" I practically screeched.
"Yeah I can see that," Ace said. "I'm going to get one of the horses."
"Not yet, Tribute has to come first."
"Then I'll get him."
"No. He doesn't load for anyone else."
"Niki, calm," Ace said, placing his large, tanned hands on my shoulders. "If you try to lead any horse, especially one as in-tuned to you as Tribute, he's going to feel how tense you are."
Those large hands started moving and I felt some of the tension go out of my shoulders and build in my gut. Something started to warm up down there as his hands massaged and moved north to my neck. His hands felt like very fine sandpaper and my protest died in my throat as the look in his chocolate eyes made my insides go liquid. As if by their own will, my hands went to his wrists.
"Nik..." he said slowly as his head started to tilt.
A shrill whinny from the barn snapped me out of whatever trance he'd put me under. I saw with horror that my head had started to tilt to meet his as well. The hands that held his wrists shoved them away and heat rushed to my face as I spun around and headed towards the barn. "He'll load just fine," I said shortly.
DAMMIT what was wrong with me? He was my STEPBROTHER for Christ's sake, and even if he wasn't, he was a Mexican. They came here illegally and stole Americans way of life. They stole away fathers-even if that father hadn't been much of a father. They took childhoods. Then came that little seed of guilt Ace had planted. That maybe he hadn't had that great a childhood either.
And just damn him anyway. No one had ever made me feel like that. That slow, liquid heat. With Drake it had been just raw passion and eventually that had worn off. I was terrified this feeling wasn't going anywhere. And there was more insanity! I was comparing Ace to an ex boyfriend, almost like I was thinking about-whoa stop right there. I wasn't in the market for another boyfriend, especially so soon after I'd been burned by one lying bastard.
I forced myself to lock the incident in a dark corner of my brain for later disposal. I wouldn't think about it ever again and would think about the root of the problem as little as possible. It wasn't going to be easy due to the fact that for the next few days we'd be in very close quarters. Whether it be bunking in a stall next to the horses, or in the cab of the truck, or in the crowds at the expo.
What a lovely five days this was going to be...